The Volcano Sequence

by Alicia Suskin Ostriker

A bold, erotic,and spiritual collection of poetry from well-respected poet and critic Alicia Suskin Ostriker, whose previous two books were both National Book Award finalists.

Genres: Poetry, Jewish

136 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

Alicia Suskin Ostriker is an American poet and scholar who writes Jewish feminist poetry.

Reviews

[M · Rating 3 out of 5]

the secret shape of this book is a parachute
all the lines leading to the person hanging there

[Brittany Mishra · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting collection of thoughts, sequences and poems. Some of them are hard to follow, but Ostiker's language still flows.

[Anna Katherine Kelley]

no

[christopher leibow · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an amazing long poem full of powerful images and powerful questions. This reminded me of Rilke’s Dunio Elegies or even in someway T.S. Elliott’s Waste Land. This is a true work of ontological meditation. I found the first half of the books to be filled with energy and longing. The running image of the Volcano was powerful. It rages and explodes but the lava slowly moves to the sea destroying everything in its path. The poems have this feeling at time of bursting and then slowly meditating with a hot eyes burning through deception and misdirection. There are so many great lines on almost every page, and the loose form of meditative journal entries allows the reader to access the poets vision. The images are tight and emotive and the fluxuating address to lover, God, mother, where you are not sure who she is talking to, takes the poems to a much deeper level. The second half of the book seemed to loose some of the heat of the first section, but this could be purposeful, it could be taking the Volcano image to its final conclusion. This is a book that I want to re-read and ponder.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a lovely, deeply spiritual collection with lots of logic to contemplate. I savored every page.

A favorite snippet of mine:

~

when she comes it will not be from heaven, it will be up from the cunts and breasts

it will be from our insane sad fecund obscure mothers

it will be from our fat scrawny pious wild ancestresses their claws

their fur and their rags

~

I greatly enjoyed this entire collection.

[Claudia Cortese · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chronicles the struggles and difficulties of trying to accept, even love, our broken world.

[Kristina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good, not great.

[Jason Allen Ashlock · Rating 5 out of 5]

Give me anything by Ostriker--poetry, prose, letters, speeches, notes scribbled on gum wrappers-- and I'll consume it again and again.

[Kelsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

A gorgeous, painful reckoning with divinity. "if there is a god, / or if there isn't a god, // a Jew studies." This book covers one lifelong attempt to reconcile lived experience and the grime of existence with the legacy of not just one mysterious god, but a more complex holiness always just past the limit of our understanding.

[Jessica]

“roots, rocks, ores, / flowings and crevasses wrinkled / pushing like joy, like fear’s thin / fluids, like love’s neediness / maybe too much / and somehow they all turned / to anger and for years / the lava poured and poured.