Vanishing Points

by Alexander J. Motyl

If Alexander Motyl’s poems are metaphysical, it’s primarily because they deal with the quivering sensation of things passing. At the same time, the poet’s language is suffused with names and places and is, thus, inextricably connected to real life. It’s as if experience and memory were playing tennis, forcing us, the readers, to pay close attention to the players and divine the rules of the game. Cityscapes resound with the living voices of people, family histories focus on loss, and the falling of leaves “makes my heart soar with boundless levity.”
—Vasyl Makhno, poet, 2013 recipient of Serbia’s Povele Morave Prize in Poetry
“Nowhere can be somewhere/and somewhere can be nowhere” writes Alexander Motyl in his new collection Vanishing Points. He shows us loss in country after country. Changing landscapes in life until it fades, but doesn’t vanish. These poems would make a beautiful film, threads of life that never end. Beautiful images of yearning that stays with the eyes.
—Gloria Mindock, poet
Alexander Motyl takes the reader on a journey from Vienna to New York through history with a literary vision and poetic rhythm. The speaker of these lively poems embraces cities and venues with trepidation and lustful abandon as if they were capricious lovers; contemplates composers, historical characters and saints with the ease of a long lost neighborhood friend. Poem to poem, wry humor and a sense of loss converge, taking to task that which stays and that which changes.
—Dzvinia Orlowsky, poet, 2007 winner of the Pushcart Prize

114 pages, Paperback

Published April 14, 2016

About the author

Alexander J. Motyl (Олександр Мотиль) is professor of political science at Rutgers University-Newark, as well as a writer and painter. He served as associate director of the Harriman Institute at Columbia University from 1992 to 1998. A specialist on Ukraine, Russia, and the USSR, he is the author of several political science books and articles.

Nominated for the Pushcart Prize in 2008 and 2013, he is the author of six novels, Whiskey Priest, Who Killed Andrei Warhol, Flippancy, The Jew Who Was Ukrainian, My Orchidia, and The Taste of Snow.

He has done performances of his fiction and poetry at the Cornelia Street Café and the Bowery Poetry Club. Motyl’s artwork has been exhibited in solo and group shows in NYC, Philadelphia, and Toronto and is on display on the Internet gallery, www.artsicle.com. He teaches at Rutgers University-Newark and lives in NYC.

Reviews

[Mary Lauren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some poems were stronger than others which makes sense but some felt more like an excuse to talk about the places he's travelled and I didn't understand all the references. Overall there are some good pieces in this collection.