A Different Distance: A Renga

by Marilyn Hacker, Karthika Naïr

An Indie Next Selection for December 2021

A Ms. Magazine Recommended Read for Fall 2021

In March 2020, France declared a full lockdown to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. Shortly thereafter, poets and friends Marilyn Hacker and Karthika Naïr—living mere miles from each other but separated by circumstance, and spurred by this extraordinary time—began a correspondence in verse.

Renga, an ancient Japanese form of collaborative poetry, is comprised of alternating tanka beginning with the themes of tōki and tōza: this season, this session. Here, from the “plague spring,” through a year in which seasons are marked by the waxing and waning of the virus, Hacker and Naïr’s renga charts the “differents and sames” of a now-shared experience. Their poems witness a time of suspension in which some things, somehow, press on relentlessly, in which solidarity persists—even thrives—in the face of a strange new kind of isolation. Between “ten thousand, yes, minutes of Bones,” there’s cancer and chemotherapy and the aches of an aging body. There is grief for the loss of friends nearby and concern for loved ones in the United States, Lebanon, and India. And there is a deep sense of shared humanity, where we all are “mere atoms of water, / each captained by protons of hydrogen, hurtling earthward.”

At turns poignant and playful, the seasons and sessions of A Different Distance display the compassionate, collective wisdom of two women witnessing a singular moment in history.

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction

96 pages, Paperback

First published December 14, 2021

About the author

Marilyn Hacker is an American poet, translator, critic, and professor of English.

Her books of poetry include Presentation Piece (1974), which won the National Book Award, Love, Death, and the Changing of the Seasons (1986), and Going Back to the River (1990). In 2009, Hacker won the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation for King of a Hundred Horsemen by Marie Étienne, which also garnered the first Robert Fagles Translation Prize from the National Poetry Series. In 2010, she received the PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry. She was shortlisted for the 2013 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation for her translation of Tales of A Severed Head by Rachida Madani.

Reviews

[Natalie Park · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such an interesting read of mundane and not so mundane between two friends/poets during the pandemic. The renga is such a lovely form, using one of the words from the last phrase and incorporating it into the next poet’s first phrase; a joining of two minds.

[Anu · Rating 5 out of 5]

A renga is a Japanese form of poetry written by two poets in alternate. The second poet picks up a word in the last line of the preceding stanza and starts with a line that includes that word. MH and KN are two poets in Paris, each living through the pandemic lockdown alone. KN starts chemotherapy for breast cancer just as Paris goes into lockdown while the multicultural MH has endured the ordeal herself many years ago. As each woman cannot meet the other, they bridge the distance by writing a poem to each other in the form of a renga each day of the 370 days they’ve endured the pandemic.
Their writing styles are so different, their lives are so different and their life experiences are so different. But the harmony created through the renga is deeply satisfying. You tear through each page feeling the sensitivity, outrage, despair, hope and yearning of each poet, connecting in surprisingly intimately ways into the next page. Great publishing from milkweed.org

[Mukul Sheopory · Rating 5 out of 5]

A "Renga"? Kinda like "Antakshari" we played as kids in India, where we took the last alphabet of the word that our friend uttered and racked our brains to come up with a word that began with that letter.. Except that its not an alphabet from the last word you have to hook onto, but a word from the last sentence.. And its not a word you concoct, but a poem.

And in this case its not just two poets playing, but two poets playing Renga during lockdown in the thick of the pandemic we just got out of... They take the shared experiences we all may have been subject to, and put them under a microscope in a way only artists can. And what comes out is a new appreciation for the weird-poignant-unique two years we are emerging from.

[lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the many pieces of art that was made in the wake of Covid-19. I preferred Karthika Nair's optimistic poems over Marilyn Hacker's wet blanket poems. Also, it seemed as if Nair was responding to the poetry of Hacker, and was being thoughtful and reflective of the wider world while Hacker seemed to be in her world, constantly bringing the conversation back to her.

Five stars for Nair, two stars for Hacker.

[St Tho · Rating 5 out of 5]

This took many pages to get into the rhythm of the writing but then I was allowed to just relax and embrace it. It did help to learn of the history first through a podcast. I recommend reading about how this book came to be before reading this book. I have never understood poetry but this was a breathtaking tale written by two women.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Of course, this renga
could not be my own story:
mine spun differently

in threads of windy season,
abandoned house plants whipping

leaves thru ocean air.
And yet, KN and MH
wove time tapestry

that accompanied the mind
that was in my head that year.

[Nan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting structure, using a very traditional poetic style (renga) to capture the very contemporary feeling of loneliness and isolation during the pandemic lockdowns.

Lyrically captures moments that resonate, even half a world away.

[Ana Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved many beautiful lines of this poetry, but much of it was a little difficult to follow. It was interesting to hear the experience of 2020 and 2021 from the perspective of strangers experiencing those COVID years in France.

[Allie]

TBR - read about on NPR - Pandemic Poetry - https://www.npr.org/2021/12/10/106281...

[Lisa Ladd · Rating 5 out of 5]

Two accomplished poets have a conversation through poetry, during the pandemic. Capturing the fear, isolation, and simple joys that occur during life in lockdowned Paris.
Savor this book.

[Juniperus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sorry I’m just not really interested in reading about Covid anymore

[Patricia N. McLaughlin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Though the idea of the renga between these two poets is laudable, the poems often seem to suffer from the solipsism that plagued many of us in quarantine during the lockdowns. In some poems, there is a sense of shared humanity expressed in grief for the loss of friends nearby and concern for loved ones abroad, which was a common pandemic experience, but too many of the poems read like letters or journal entries shared between friends familiar with the chatty name dropping of particular places and people. That said, there’s this gem, penned by Nair, that might be the most priceless jewel of the collection:

“The COVID Age: that
may be the Anthropocene’s
gift to the planet.”

Favorite Poems:
“My atheist’s heart”
“Notebooks and longing”
“The COVID Age: that”