The Irrationalist

by Suzanne Buffam

Poetry. Tenth Anniversary Edition. In acclaimed poet Suzanne Buffam's second collection, her unusual range, formal rigor, and imaginative force are on full display as we are introduced to the wry meditations of a literary "irrationalist" who pursues her own poetic logic beyond the bounds of reason. Throughout the collection, in resolutely modern, rueful and eccentric lyrics, Buffam investigates the shifting grounds of knowledge while refusing to take any philosophical authority too seriously. Together, these poems compose a swift, durable, protean argument for the necessity of interior maps in a world that may be on the eve of extinction, but whose darkness is continually illuminated by a pyrotechnics of curiosity, candor, and wit.

"THE IRRATIONALIST takes nothing for granted. Its rhythms manage to mimic the mind at work, the mind edgy and witty and sharp. The tones are brave and sweeping, ready to re-define the world, alert not only to history and the exigencies of the contemporary, but also to larger questions to do with philosophy, with time and space."--Judges' Citation for the 2011 Griffin Prize Shortlist

Genres: Poetry

104 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2020

About the author

Suzanne Buffam is a Canadian poet, author of two collections of poetry. Her first, Past Imperfect: Poems (House of Anansi Press, 2005), won the Gerald Lampert Award in 2006. Her second, The Irrationalist (Carnarium Books, 2010), was shortlisted for the 2011 Griffin Poetry Prize. Her poems have been published in literary journals and magazines including Poetry, Jubilat, A Public Space, Denver Quarterly, Colorado Review, Books in Canada, and Prairie Schooner; and in anthologies including Breathing Fire: Canada's New Poets. She earned an MA in English from Concordia University in Montreal, and an MFA from the Iowa Writers' Workshop. She currently teaches creative writing at the University of Chicago.

Buffam was a judge for the 2013 Griffin Poetry Prize.

Reviews

[JB · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another book of real poems from this press. The Irrationalist by Suzanne Buffam. Surreal, philosophical, slapstick in some ways?, sophisticated, poetically rigorous. I think I get a whiff of Stevens—devotee of the irrational element in poetry—in the sing-songiness, the exclamation point in one poem, and the way that constantly shifting perception is the subject matter, mind where universe is its “interior.” “[Old experiences] lay in ash heaps along the roadside / And blew in drifts across the fairgrounds and fields” in one poem and by the end “The sun came out. It was the old sun / With only a few billion years left to shine.” In another a pygymy hippopotamus gives way to capybara gives way all the way down to a fly. But this is a voice all its own, where time is also a dimension, full of Nova Scotia, Paris, ducks, and tongue twisters like “We must above all try not to worry. Sometimes I worry that I am not trying not to try hard enough.” In short, a book full of wonders, imagination, and the universe.


TELESCOPIC INTERIOR

Solar wind singing in a bottle cap.
Distant drone of stone
Drilled through for more stone

Less prone to collapse.
Add fire. Add feat days and photons
And glue the whole mess

Together in a nerve net
Swinging through the cosmos on a peg.
If you can sleep through this

Send me a lullaby
From your crib of green dreams.
Down here the weather’s red

And the century’s turning
Every storm back to port.
At the last resort

They’re selling sand as souvenirs.
The roses have never looked lonelier,
Less photogenic, but get this—

They’re going ahead with the festival.
They’re addressing the peacock dilemma.
They’re dredging the harbor.

They’re shooting pitchforks at the moon.
Through a cracked telescope
I watch the late show unfold

Its milky arabesque across the deep.
How could I sleep? The brightest star
In the sky tonight is a planet

Called Tomorrow.
I used to live there.
I should know.