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In the Salt Marsh: Poems
In this strong, appealing collection, Nancy Willard shares her passion for observing the mysteries of the natural world, particularly the flora and fauna of Cape Cod and the Hudson Valley, where many of these poems are set. We see, through her eyes, the coming of darkness to an empty orchard, the retreat of deer at dusk, and the breakup of a river with the onset of spring. Willard is also deeply engaged with the living creatures that populate her world. Her poems record her encounter with a moon snail and her celebration of the ladybugs she sends into the garden and the butterflies that alight on her shoulders like ghostly kisses.
Amid poems about the intimate presence of nature are expressions of absences deeply felt. Willard is drawn not just to the inhabited world but also to the empty spaces with which our passage through life is strewn. In “The Absence at the Swing,” a rabbit watches a swing’s back-and-forth motion just after the children have left the playground; in “Niche Without Statue,” she takes us to “an alcove scoured / to stucco light” and tells us, “Somebody lived here. Stepped away. No tracks.” We learn, too, of the presences she misses most deeply, as in “Phone Poem,” in which she imagines receiving a telephone call from her father after his death.
Whether she is cultivating a sense of the life that is all around her or attending to the losses felt within, Nancy Willard never ceases to enchant us with the sense of dedication and awe that graces her verse.
Amid poems about the intimate presence of nature are expressions of absences deeply felt. Willard is drawn not just to the inhabited world but also to the empty spaces with which our passage through life is strewn. In “The Absence at the Swing,” a rabbit watches a swing’s back-and-forth motion just after the children have left the playground; in “Niche Without Statue,” she takes us to “an alcove scoured / to stucco light” and tells us, “Somebody lived here. Stepped away. No tracks.” We learn, too, of the presences she misses most deeply, as in “Phone Poem,” in which she imagines receiving a telephone call from her father after his death.
Whether she is cultivating a sense of the life that is all around her or attending to the losses felt within, Nancy Willard never ceases to enchant us with the sense of dedication and awe that graces her verse.
- GenresPoetry
72 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
76 people want to read
About the author
Nancy Willard
99 books42 followersNANCY WILLARD was an award-winning children's author, poet, and essayist who received the Newbery Medal in 1982 for A Visit to William Blake's Inn. She wrote dozens of volumes of children's fiction and poetry, including The Flying Bed, Sweep Dreams, and Cinderella's Dress. She also authored two novels for adults, Things Invisible to See and Sister Water, and twelve books of poetry, including Swimming Lessons: New and Selected Poems. She lived with her husband, photographer Eric Lindbloom, and taught at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 1, 2012
Beautiful language, fine use of form, and accessible subjects. I really enjoy reading this author.
November 9, 2012
Nancy Willard’s first collection of poems in several years brilliantly displays her considerable gifts of observation and her special genius for finding just the right words to evoke images and feelings in ways that surprise and delight. Whether writing about ladybugs in her garden, rows of bicycles standing at racks, or missing her father, Willard provides spark after spark to set the tinder of the reader’s imagination aflame.
“Oh, ancient lady, I hope you are streaking to heaven / in new sneakers,” says Willard to the spirit of (presumably) her mother, as family and priest prepare to bury the ashes of the dead:
and you sift out of sight into the world’s weather,
but a curl of ash plumes out like a wish:
Let me go, children, and bless each other.
In a poem in which she declares “I shall become a disciple of clouds,” Willard offers this description of the oft-described phenomenon of the lifting fog:
This morning I saw clouds rise from the mowed field
where they camped all night under the mountain
and departed in sunlit coaches,
turning away, into the clean sky.
In poem after poem, Willard elevates and enlivens language. She speaks of “the road / unwinding this tale” and of “glad words running to meet you.” Of her marriage ceremony in the home of a justice of the peace, she writes
My love and I sat on the sofa, waiting.
The justice changed into his marrying clothes. . .
While on the television in the background,
Two continents away, we strafed a shore
I’d never heard of. Cut to the president:
“We seek no wider war.”
The home of her parents has complementary qualities:
My father’s house was made of sky.
His bookcases stood twelve feet high.
At the same time,
My mother’s house was made of talk,
words that could rouse a flea to fight
or make a stone stand up and walk.
Her father’s zone is that of the cosmos, of happily knowing the names of stones and stars, while her mother revels in the world of Psalms and telling tales; the poet rests somewhere between -- “my house stands open to the sky.”
In reading Nancy Willard’s poetry, interpretation has always been secondary to the sheer joy of listening to the play of words that tell us things we already know but in ways that demonstrate that we never really quite knew them before. Read her poetry aloud; read it outside in the sun, or while standing in an open doorway looking out at the rain; type your favorites up on single sheets of paper and post them on your kitchen cabinets to read while preparing dinner. You will as a consequence step more lightly as you go on your way, newly open to the sky.
“Oh, ancient lady, I hope you are streaking to heaven / in new sneakers,” says Willard to the spirit of (presumably) her mother, as family and priest prepare to bury the ashes of the dead:
and you sift out of sight into the world’s weather,
but a curl of ash plumes out like a wish:
Let me go, children, and bless each other.
In a poem in which she declares “I shall become a disciple of clouds,” Willard offers this description of the oft-described phenomenon of the lifting fog:
This morning I saw clouds rise from the mowed field
where they camped all night under the mountain
and departed in sunlit coaches,
turning away, into the clean sky.
In poem after poem, Willard elevates and enlivens language. She speaks of “the road / unwinding this tale” and of “glad words running to meet you.” Of her marriage ceremony in the home of a justice of the peace, she writes
My love and I sat on the sofa, waiting.
The justice changed into his marrying clothes. . .
While on the television in the background,
Two continents away, we strafed a shore
I’d never heard of. Cut to the president:
“We seek no wider war.”
The home of her parents has complementary qualities:
My father’s house was made of sky.
His bookcases stood twelve feet high.
At the same time,
My mother’s house was made of talk,
words that could rouse a flea to fight
or make a stone stand up and walk.
Her father’s zone is that of the cosmos, of happily knowing the names of stones and stars, while her mother revels in the world of Psalms and telling tales; the poet rests somewhere between -- “my house stands open to the sky.”
In reading Nancy Willard’s poetry, interpretation has always been secondary to the sheer joy of listening to the play of words that tell us things we already know but in ways that demonstrate that we never really quite knew them before. Read her poetry aloud; read it outside in the sun, or while standing in an open doorway looking out at the rain; type your favorites up on single sheets of paper and post them on your kitchen cabinets to read while preparing dinner. You will as a consequence step more lightly as you go on your way, newly open to the sky.
January 8, 2014
To read the poet Nancy Willard is to feel that perhaps she attended your family gatherings of many years back, when your aunts & mother were all alive & still telling great stories.
This crisp collection is one of several that Nancy Willard has written or edited & I would wager that all her collections make fine companions as you make your rounds. A piece I wrote about Nancy Willard also includes the poet Natasha Trethewey:
http://bookseedstudio.wordpress.com/t...
This crisp collection is one of several that Nancy Willard has written or edited & I would wager that all her collections make fine companions as you make your rounds. A piece I wrote about Nancy Willard also includes the poet Natasha Trethewey:
http://bookseedstudio.wordpress.com/t...
August 8, 2012
“Willard crafts verse so well that even her less successful poems are impressive, and her best poems seem unsurpassably good.” --Booklist
“Willard's tender, careful 10th volume of verse for adults is her first since the 1996 new-and-selected SWIMMING LESSONS, and it returns to the gardens, riversides, parables and Northeastern landscapes whose patterns she has made her own.” --Publishers Weekly
“Willard's tender, careful 10th volume of verse for adults is her first since the 1996 new-and-selected SWIMMING LESSONS, and it returns to the gardens, riversides, parables and Northeastern landscapes whose patterns she has made her own.” --Publishers Weekly
October 7, 2008
Great collection of poems. About daily life with kids and husband. Noticing the small things.
December 23, 2011
Well crafted, surprising images. But mostly quietly meditative and reflective upon nature. A little TOO quiet for my personal tastes, though this poet is clearly talented at her craft.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews