What do you think?
Rate this book
Selected Poems 1965-1975
We sell Rare, out-of-print, uncommon, & used BOOKS, PRINTS, MAPS, DOCUMENTS, AND EPHEMERA. We do not sell ebooks, print on demand, or other reproduced materials. Each item you see here is individually described and imaged. We welcome further inquiries.
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1976
132 people are currently reading
2906 people want to read
About the author
Margaret Atwood
664 books89.3k followersMargaret Atwood was born in 1939 in Ottawa and grew up in northern Ontario, Quebec, and Toronto. She received her undergraduate degree from Victoria College at the University of Toronto and her master's degree from Radcliffe College.
Throughout her writing career, Margaret Atwood has received numerous awards and honourary degrees. She is the author of more than thirty-five volumes of poetry, children’s literature, fiction, and non-fiction and is perhaps best known for her novels, which include The Edible Woman (1970), The Handmaid's Tale (1983), The Robber Bride (1994), Alias Grace (1996), and The Blind Assassin, which won the prestigious Booker Prize in 2000. Atwood's dystopic novel, Oryx and Crake, was published in 2003. The Tent (mini-fictions) and Moral Disorder (short stories) both appeared in 2006. Her most recent volume of poetry, The Door, was published in 2007. Her non-fiction book, Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth in the Massey series, appeared in 2008, and her most recent novel, The Year of the Flood, in the autumn of 2009. Ms. Atwood's work has been published in more than forty languages, including Farsi, Japanese, Turkish, Finnish, Korean, Icelandic and Estonian. In 2004 she co-invented the Long Pen TM.
Margaret Atwood currently lives in Toronto with writer Graeme Gibson.
Associations: Margaret Atwood was President of the Writers' Union of Canada from May 1981 to May 1982, and was President of International P.E.N., Canadian Centre (English Speaking) from 1984-1986. She and Graeme Gibson are the Joint Honourary Presidents of the Rare Bird Society within BirdLife International. Ms. Atwood is also a current Vice-President of PEN International.
Throughout her writing career, Margaret Atwood has received numerous awards and honourary degrees. She is the author of more than thirty-five volumes of poetry, children’s literature, fiction, and non-fiction and is perhaps best known for her novels, which include The Edible Woman (1970), The Handmaid's Tale (1983), The Robber Bride (1994), Alias Grace (1996), and The Blind Assassin, which won the prestigious Booker Prize in 2000. Atwood's dystopic novel, Oryx and Crake, was published in 2003. The Tent (mini-fictions) and Moral Disorder (short stories) both appeared in 2006. Her most recent volume of poetry, The Door, was published in 2007. Her non-fiction book, Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth in the Massey series, appeared in 2008, and her most recent novel, The Year of the Flood, in the autumn of 2009. Ms. Atwood's work has been published in more than forty languages, including Farsi, Japanese, Turkish, Finnish, Korean, Icelandic and Estonian. In 2004 she co-invented the Long Pen TM.
Margaret Atwood currently lives in Toronto with writer Graeme Gibson.
Associations: Margaret Atwood was President of the Writers' Union of Canada from May 1981 to May 1982, and was President of International P.E.N., Canadian Centre (English Speaking) from 1984-1986. She and Graeme Gibson are the Joint Honourary Presidents of the Rare Bird Society within BirdLife International. Ms. Atwood is also a current Vice-President of PEN International.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 91 reviews
July 1, 2014
Game After Supper
This is before electricity,
it is when there were porches.
On the sagging porch an old man
is rocking. The porch is wooden,
the house is wooden and grey;
in the living room which smells of
smoke and mildew, soon
the woman will light the kerosene lamp.
There is a barn but I am not in the barn;
there is an orchard too, gone bad,
its apples like soft cork
but I am not there either.
I am hiding in the long grass
with my two dead cousins,
the membrane grown already
across their throats.
We hear crickets and our own hearts
close to our ears;
though we giggle, we are afraid.
From the shadows around
the corner of the house
a tall man is coming to find us:
He will be an uncle,
If we are lucky.
Happy Canada Day Good Readers!
This is before electricity,
it is when there were porches.
On the sagging porch an old man
is rocking. The porch is wooden,
the house is wooden and grey;
in the living room which smells of
smoke and mildew, soon
the woman will light the kerosene lamp.
There is a barn but I am not in the barn;
there is an orchard too, gone bad,
its apples like soft cork
but I am not there either.
I am hiding in the long grass
with my two dead cousins,
the membrane grown already
across their throats.
We hear crickets and our own hearts
close to our ears;
though we giggle, we are afraid.
From the shadows around
the corner of the house
a tall man is coming to find us:
He will be an uncle,
If we are lucky.
Happy Canada Day Good Readers!
September 30, 2025
Many of the selected poems in this collection are introspective, mostly told by female narrators. They tell about emotions, relationships, and the search for personal identity. The theme of Canadian identity runs through many of the poems where nature, the wilderness, settlers, and indigenous people all play a part. In "The Journals of Susanna Moodie," Margaret Atwood imagines the life of a real pioneer woman who immigrated from England to the bush in Upper Canada. The "Power Politics" section is very dark as it portrays women being victimized by men. Poems from "You Are Happy" are lighter, with many retelling the stories of the Siren, Circe, and Penelope from "The Odyssey."
Social issues, the search for identity, and survival are examined as Atwood's narrators go on their journeys in locales ranging from the Canadian wilderness to the Greek islands to a rooming house in Boston to indigenous mythical lands. The poet often looks to the past to examine contemporary social issues. The poems were selected from six books of poetry--"The Circle Game," "The Animals in That Country," "The Journals of Susanna Moodie," "Procedures for Underground," "Power Politics," and "You Are Happy." The book gave a wonderful overview of Atwood's early poetry.
Epigraph from "Power Politics"
you fit into me
like a hook into an eye
a fish hook
an open eye
The Planters (from "The Journals of Susanna Moodie")
They moved between the jagged edge
of the forest and the jagged river
on a stumpy patch of cleared land
my husband, a neighbor, another man
weeding the few rows
of string beans and dusty potatoes.
They bend straighten; the sun
lights up their faces and hands candles
flickering in the wind against the
unbright earth. I see them; I know
none of them believe they are here.
They deny the ground they stand on,
pretend this dirt is the future.
And they are right. If they let go
of that illusion solid to them as a shovel,
open their eyes even for a moment
to these trees, to this particular sun
they would be surrounded, stormed, broken
in upon branches, roots tendrils, the dark
side of light
as I am.
Social issues, the search for identity, and survival are examined as Atwood's narrators go on their journeys in locales ranging from the Canadian wilderness to the Greek islands to a rooming house in Boston to indigenous mythical lands. The poet often looks to the past to examine contemporary social issues. The poems were selected from six books of poetry--"The Circle Game," "The Animals in That Country," "The Journals of Susanna Moodie," "Procedures for Underground," "Power Politics," and "You Are Happy." The book gave a wonderful overview of Atwood's early poetry.
Epigraph from "Power Politics"
you fit into me
like a hook into an eye
a fish hook
an open eye
The Planters (from "The Journals of Susanna Moodie")
They moved between the jagged edge
of the forest and the jagged river
on a stumpy patch of cleared land
my husband, a neighbor, another man
weeding the few rows
of string beans and dusty potatoes.
They bend straighten; the sun
lights up their faces and hands candles
flickering in the wind against the
unbright earth. I see them; I know
none of them believe they are here.
They deny the ground they stand on,
pretend this dirt is the future.
And they are right. If they let go
of that illusion solid to them as a shovel,
open their eyes even for a moment
to these trees, to this particular sun
they would be surrounded, stormed, broken
in upon branches, roots tendrils, the dark
side of light
as I am.
Read
December 29, 2022DREAM 2 : BRIAN THE STILL-HUNTER
The man I saw in the forest
used to come to our house
every morning, never said anything;
I learned from the neighbours later
he once tried to cut his throat.
I found him at the end of the path
sitting on a fallen tree
cleaning his gun.
There was no wind;
around us the leaves rustled.
He said to me:
I kill because I have to
but every time I aim, I feel
my skin grow fur
my head heavy with antlers
and during the stretched instant
the bullet glides on its thread of speed
my soul runs innocent as hooves.
Is God just to his creatures?
I die more often than many.
He looked up and I saw
the white scar made by the hunting knife
around his neck.
When I woke
I remembered: he has been gone
twenty years and not heard from.
The man I saw in the forest
used to come to our house
every morning, never said anything;
I learned from the neighbours later
he once tried to cut his throat.
I found him at the end of the path
sitting on a fallen tree
cleaning his gun.
There was no wind;
around us the leaves rustled.
He said to me:
I kill because I have to
but every time I aim, I feel
my skin grow fur
my head heavy with antlers
and during the stretched instant
the bullet glides on its thread of speed
my soul runs innocent as hooves.
Is God just to his creatures?
I die more often than many.
He looked up and I saw
the white scar made by the hunting knife
around his neck.
When I woke
I remembered: he has been gone
twenty years and not heard from.
September 27, 2020
Margaret Atwood is not a writer nor a poet; she's a witch, and she creates magic with her words.
January 21, 2020
iii
You held out your hand
I took your fingerprints
You asked for love
I gave you only descriptions
Please die I said
so I can write about it
(Their attitudes differ)
You held out your hand
I took your fingerprints
You asked for love
I gave you only descriptions
Please die I said
so I can write about it
(Their attitudes differ)
May 24, 2010
Beautiful, clear, steady, and powerful poems. They get substantially better/stronger when she hits the 1971 mark. The "Power Politics" collection is incredible. Atwood's mind and words are fortifying.
"My right hand unfolds rivers
around you, my left hand releases its trees
I speak rain.
I spin you on a night and you hide in it."
"My right hand unfolds rivers
around you, my left hand releases its trees
I speak rain.
I spin you on a night and you hide in it."
August 15, 2016
I think most people on this planet 18+ could write a better poetry book than this one
January 27, 2009
I read a scattered few of Atwood's poems in college classes and textbooks, and a few months ago I read her spin on the story of Odysseus, Penelopiad, but only now that I've consumed about 250 pages of her poems do I have a solid picture of her as a writer. This collection is a bit of a monster -- it includes excerpts from six separate works (many of which are themselves divided into smaller works) and spans the first ten years of her career -- and for the first hundred pages or so I resented the absence of any kind of introduction that would guide me, help me pinpoint the poems and themes that most needed attention.
Fortunately the poems speak for themselves, and a few of them are absolute wonders. "Pre-Amphibian", "It Is Dangerous to Read Newspapers", "More and More", "1837 War in Retrospect", "Three Desk Objects", "They Eat Out", and a couple of the untitled poems from Power Politics I dog-eared for a closer look next time I pick up this book. Atwood's growth in ambition and confidence is evident over the course of this collection -- she starts and ends a distant, dissatisfied and even contemptuous lover, but gradually her poems are grounded less and less in her daily experiences and more and more in the worlds of gender politics, of nature conservation, and of classic literature. For about twenty pages in You Are Happy she lends her voice to the mythical nymph Circe, who is grudgingly beckoned out of self-imposed loneliness by Odysseus's arrival on her island. In that section, in particular, shine forth Atwood's senses of history, of relentless fate, of our human refusal to admit to ourselves our inability to control our own desires and destinies.
Highly recommended.
Fortunately the poems speak for themselves, and a few of them are absolute wonders. "Pre-Amphibian", "It Is Dangerous to Read Newspapers", "More and More", "1837 War in Retrospect", "Three Desk Objects", "They Eat Out", and a couple of the untitled poems from Power Politics I dog-eared for a closer look next time I pick up this book. Atwood's growth in ambition and confidence is evident over the course of this collection -- she starts and ends a distant, dissatisfied and even contemptuous lover, but gradually her poems are grounded less and less in her daily experiences and more and more in the worlds of gender politics, of nature conservation, and of classic literature. For about twenty pages in You Are Happy she lends her voice to the mythical nymph Circe, who is grudgingly beckoned out of self-imposed loneliness by Odysseus's arrival on her island. In that section, in particular, shine forth Atwood's senses of history, of relentless fate, of our human refusal to admit to ourselves our inability to control our own desires and destinies.
Highly recommended.
September 3, 2023
Poemas simplemente preciosos
January 17, 2020
Incredible.
July 11, 2022
If i love you, is that a fact or a weapon?
.
This is not what i want, but i want this also.
.
This is not what i want, but i want this also.
December 26, 2023
It has some good pieces but I couldn't vibe with it. I don't understand Atwood's rhythm in poetry and the person who made the Croatian edition did not care. A lot of poems are translated poorly and some are repeated to fill pages.
April 27, 2012
Written February 14, 2007:
Because a friend has mentioned Atwood and Horowitz, I bring out the beer stashed under my bed in case of emergencies. And this moment seems to be pressing, somewhere, something is breaking, inside my body. I put on George Bruch: Violin Concerto No.1 in G Minor, and then, this.
There is time to smoke, in a while. For now, a poem:
In my Market Research class, we were tasked to conduct personal interviews all over Manila about the latest ad campaign for Coke. A lot of them don't remember anything now. A lot of them don't even drink it now.
The tea phenomenon is invading the metro. They say, We have to keep the body clean. Detoxify. Keep healthy. Here: it is a temple, where your blood runs like a peaceful river. Like Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata on a sad night with no rain. This is how quiet the body can be.
I just took my can of beer and emptied it onto the bathroom sink. I put some water to boil, brought out a packet of dried leaves, smelling jasmine, the only thing I'll find around this house now. I've read somewhere that Longjing is a famous Chinese tea. It stands for Dragon Well. Yun Wu is for Cloud and Mist. Chun Mee means precious eyebrows.
It's a known fact that drinking tea can be good for the body, especially the heart.
Chopin pitter-patters with Nocturne. I tiptoed around the kitchen trying not to make any noise. Everyone else is asleep; there's no one to stay up for, no one to think about at this time.
His birthday in two days.
Teacup in hand, I return to my room to find Bach's Air playing. Ah, but what else can I do but sit in the corner of my room, by the floor. Then, Franz Schubert casually slips into Unfinished Symphony No. 8. I now feel archaic. Time-worn. Passé. I think I sleep somewhere between forgotten and vanished.
Because a friend has mentioned Atwood and Horowitz, I bring out the beer stashed under my bed in case of emergencies. And this moment seems to be pressing, somewhere, something is breaking, inside my body. I put on George Bruch: Violin Concerto No.1 in G Minor, and then, this.
There is time to smoke, in a while. For now, a poem:
I Was Reading a Scientific Article
Margaret Atwood
They have photographed the brain
and here is the picture, it is full of
branches as I always suspected,
each time you arrive the electricity
of seeing you is a huge
tree lumbering through my skull, the roots waving.
It is an earth, its fibres wrap
things buried, your forgotten words
are graved in my head, an intricate
red blue and pink prehensile chemistry
veined like a leaf
network, or is it a seascape
with corals and shining tentacles.
I touch you, I am created in you
somewhere as a complex
filament of light
You rest on me and my shoulder holds
your heavy unbelievable
skull, crowded with radiant
suns, a new planet, the people
submerged in you, a lost civilization
I can never excavate:
my hands trace the contours of a total
universe, its different
colors, flowers, its undiscovered
animals, violent or serene
its other air
its claws
its paradise rivers
***
In my Market Research class, we were tasked to conduct personal interviews all over Manila about the latest ad campaign for Coke. A lot of them don't remember anything now. A lot of them don't even drink it now.
The tea phenomenon is invading the metro. They say, We have to keep the body clean. Detoxify. Keep healthy. Here: it is a temple, where your blood runs like a peaceful river. Like Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata on a sad night with no rain. This is how quiet the body can be.
I just took my can of beer and emptied it onto the bathroom sink. I put some water to boil, brought out a packet of dried leaves, smelling jasmine, the only thing I'll find around this house now. I've read somewhere that Longjing is a famous Chinese tea. It stands for Dragon Well. Yun Wu is for Cloud and Mist. Chun Mee means precious eyebrows.
It's a known fact that drinking tea can be good for the body, especially the heart.
***
Chopin pitter-patters with Nocturne. I tiptoed around the kitchen trying not to make any noise. Everyone else is asleep; there's no one to stay up for, no one to think about at this time.
***
Teacup in hand, I return to my room to find Bach's Air playing. Ah, but what else can I do but sit in the corner of my room, by the floor. Then, Franz Schubert casually slips into Unfinished Symphony No. 8. I now feel archaic. Time-worn. Passé. I think I sleep somewhere between forgotten and vanished.
January 18, 2012
Everything Atwood writes is really bleak. I like that.
June 28, 2021
I have found that poetry's power is most intimately linked to the reader's individual and subjective circumstances at the time of reading it, so...a selection of poems collected over the years, with highly varying tones and topics and notes and images, will find me slipping in and out of these pages, breezing through some and drowning in others.
the concluding pieces stuck to me most intimately: selections from Interlunar ("Doorway" "The Saints" "Keep" and "Eurydice") and True Stories ("Variations on the World Love/Sleep" "Sunset II"), with their cold and keen insight and calming, bittersweet nostalgia.
the concluding pieces stuck to me most intimately: selections from Interlunar ("Doorway" "The Saints" "Keep" and "Eurydice") and True Stories ("Variations on the World Love/Sleep" "Sunset II"), with their cold and keen insight and calming, bittersweet nostalgia.
August 27, 2023
"(My body turned against me
too soon, it was not a tragedy"
Goated 🐐
too soon, it was not a tragedy"
Goated 🐐
July 23, 2024
Last year I abstained
this year I devour
without guilt
which is also an art
Such a powerful collection, full of sharp, precise metaphors. We look at the world through the author's mysteries, observations of the inner and the outside, emotions taking the shape of mirrors and animals. I haven't read such great poetry for a long time.
this year I devour
without guilt
which is also an art
Such a powerful collection, full of sharp, precise metaphors. We look at the world through the author's mysteries, observations of the inner and the outside, emotions taking the shape of mirrors and animals. I haven't read such great poetry for a long time.
March 4, 2023
8/10
I’m definitely not a poetry person and will not pick up another poetry book for a hot second (had to do this for class) but some of these were really moving. I can’t say she writes in my style but I still liked her style though the frequent parentheses got to be a lot in several of the longer poems. I liked the ones about women, especially the ones I could comprehend, and I think my fav was Against Still Life.
I’m definitely not a poetry person and will not pick up another poetry book for a hot second (had to do this for class) but some of these were really moving. I can’t say she writes in my style but I still liked her style though the frequent parentheses got to be a lot in several of the longer poems. I liked the ones about women, especially the ones I could comprehend, and I think my fav was Against Still Life.
June 21, 2015
I read volume II of Atwood’s Selected Poems first, assuming that a good poet would get better with time. I was right. However, Atwood is so very wonderful with her deliciously dark poems, dry wit, and dramatic dialogues that I couldn’t resist going back for more. The very first poem in this book shows why I keep coming back to her. Titled “This Is a Photography of Me,” she chills us to the bone when she gets to “The photograph was taken/the day after I drowned.”
Particularly appealing to me were her poems from The Journals of Susanna Moodie (1970), a woman who relocated to Quebec from England in 1832, who wasn’t prepared for how difficult her life would be. Who could be? In “Thoughts from Underground,” she begins, “When I first reached this country/I hated it/and I hate it more each year.” In another poem she tells of her son’s death by drowning and ends, “I planted him in this country/like a flag.”
Atwood takes her skill at monologues to a new level in a series of poems called “Songs of the Transformed” in which we hear from a pig, bull, rat, crow, worms, owl, siren, fox, severed hen’s head, and corpse.” Her dark poems are my favorites, but Atwood is able to catch you off guard by describing beauty, too, as she does in “Woman Skating,” whom she admits, “(actually, she is my mother…),” ending, “Over all I place/a glass bell.”
Particularly appealing to me were her poems from The Journals of Susanna Moodie (1970), a woman who relocated to Quebec from England in 1832, who wasn’t prepared for how difficult her life would be. Who could be? In “Thoughts from Underground,” she begins, “When I first reached this country/I hated it/and I hate it more each year.” In another poem she tells of her son’s death by drowning and ends, “I planted him in this country/like a flag.”
Atwood takes her skill at monologues to a new level in a series of poems called “Songs of the Transformed” in which we hear from a pig, bull, rat, crow, worms, owl, siren, fox, severed hen’s head, and corpse.” Her dark poems are my favorites, but Atwood is able to catch you off guard by describing beauty, too, as she does in “Woman Skating,” whom she admits, “(actually, she is my mother…),” ending, “Over all I place/a glass bell.”
July 16, 2010
I need to go back to this one more. There are groupings of poems that I have forgotten the reason for, but that's okay, I trust her writing.
"Unfortunately I don't have leaves.
Instead I have eyes
and teeth and other non-green
things which rule out osmosis.
So be careful, I mean it,
I give you a fair warning:''
I close in mid poem where I began citing ("More and More". Soon again, and time to get the next set of years, seems to me, although I've read several of those, too, over the past years when they showed up here or there.
"Unfortunately I don't have leaves.
Instead I have eyes
and teeth and other non-green
things which rule out osmosis.
So be careful, I mean it,
I give you a fair warning:''
I close in mid poem where I began citing ("More and More". Soon again, and time to get the next set of years, seems to me, although I've read several of those, too, over the past years when they showed up here or there.
August 2, 2014
You held out your hand
I took your fingerprints
You asked for love
I gave you only descriptions
Please die I said
so I can write about it
After all you are quite
ordinary: 2 arms 2 legs
a head, a reasonable
body, toes & fingers, a few
eccentricities, a few honesties
but not too many, too many
postponements & regrets but
you'll adjust to it, meeting
deadlines and other
people, pretending to love
the wrong woman some of the
time, listening to your brain
shrink, your diaries
expanding as you grow older
I took your fingerprints
You asked for love
I gave you only descriptions
Please die I said
so I can write about it
After all you are quite
ordinary: 2 arms 2 legs
a head, a reasonable
body, toes & fingers, a few
eccentricities, a few honesties
but not too many, too many
postponements & regrets but
you'll adjust to it, meeting
deadlines and other
people, pretending to love
the wrong woman some of the
time, listening to your brain
shrink, your diaries
expanding as you grow older
January 13, 2017
I've said elsewhere that Yanks make horrible poets. This was grossly unfair. Canadian poets, by and large, are every bit as rotten.
Google Atwood's name, and it doesn't mention Booker Winner, Governor-General Award winner etc. It lists her as 'poet.' This strikes me as false advertising. In all this collection only one sequence stood out, a play on the theme of childhood dolls (though the fifth and dullest part needed chopping).
Dud.
Google Atwood's name, and it doesn't mention Booker Winner, Governor-General Award winner etc. It lists her as 'poet.' This strikes me as false advertising. In all this collection only one sequence stood out, a play on the theme of childhood dolls (though the fifth and dullest part needed chopping).
Dud.
January 22, 2025
I can’t find the words for how much I adore and respect your imagination. Her words burn like cold chains but are delicate as an old cobweb. And there is a forest inside this book, inside my mind, she now prowls in it. I am trying desperately to make this book mine but know I can only pass by.
October 23, 2008
I always seem to read this collection when I'm down. I think these were her best poems - the ones thereafter are not so thrilling.
November 30, 2011
I continue reading through Margaret Atwood. Her versatility astounds me. In the ten years that these poems span, it is good to watch her growth as a poet.
February 17, 2013
songs of the transformed are some of the most poignant poems I have ever read and are my favorite to read again and again
August 30, 2016
It is astounding how many quality words flow out of this woman. Her poetry is quite accessible, but don't think it simple.
December 30, 2017
I began reading this book back in April. My mother was hospitalized and I read some of the poems to her. Her attention span was short, so, I began picking up books of poetry to share with her and this was one, I lucked out in finding at a local used book store.
I decided to finish reading this collection today, before years end. I also re read some I had already read.
First, Atwood, is such an amazing writer. Her understanding and use of metaphors is simply and beautifully captured in this collection. I had a hard time picking one favorite poem but, I have to say the stanza in 'Their Attitudes Differ'
You refuse to own
yourself, you permit
others to do it for you:
Wow! as she goes on to write, the words simply slipped into my mind creating visual pictures. This is when I know I love reading poetry. I have always loved poetry really, more than anything as it gets down to the nuts and bolts of writing, imagery steps in and the reader envisions what they will.
I cannot say much else except this was a beautiful book of chosen poetry by one of the most talented writers of our time.
I do have to say I felt her 'Songs of the Transformed were brilliant! Pig Song, Bull Song, Rat Song, Crow Song, Song of the Worms, Owl Song-especially beginning 'I am the heart of a murdered woman who took the wrong way home...Wow, then Siren Song, Song of the Fox, Song of the Hen's Head only finally to end with Corpse Song "I enter your night like a darkened boat, a smuggler"
I am thrilled to have finished this collection and re read them today, in a much more contained state of mind than when I shared them with my mother before her death.
I highly recommend this collection of poems for anyone who loves poetry but, also, those who bask in beautifully written language or prose.
iii
A truth should exist
it should not be used like this. I I love you
Is that a fact or a weapon?
Just another snippet from the poem 'Their Attitudes Differ'
Yes five stars. I do need to read more poetry this year.
I decided to finish reading this collection today, before years end. I also re read some I had already read.
First, Atwood, is such an amazing writer. Her understanding and use of metaphors is simply and beautifully captured in this collection. I had a hard time picking one favorite poem but, I have to say the stanza in 'Their Attitudes Differ'
You refuse to own
yourself, you permit
others to do it for you:
Wow! as she goes on to write, the words simply slipped into my mind creating visual pictures. This is when I know I love reading poetry. I have always loved poetry really, more than anything as it gets down to the nuts and bolts of writing, imagery steps in and the reader envisions what they will.
I cannot say much else except this was a beautiful book of chosen poetry by one of the most talented writers of our time.
I do have to say I felt her 'Songs of the Transformed were brilliant! Pig Song, Bull Song, Rat Song, Crow Song, Song of the Worms, Owl Song-especially beginning 'I am the heart of a murdered woman who took the wrong way home...Wow, then Siren Song, Song of the Fox, Song of the Hen's Head only finally to end with Corpse Song "I enter your night like a darkened boat, a smuggler"
I am thrilled to have finished this collection and re read them today, in a much more contained state of mind than when I shared them with my mother before her death.
I highly recommend this collection of poems for anyone who loves poetry but, also, those who bask in beautifully written language or prose.
iii
A truth should exist
it should not be used like this. I I love you
Is that a fact or a weapon?
Just another snippet from the poem 'Their Attitudes Differ'
Yes five stars. I do need to read more poetry this year.
November 22, 2021
Please take a moment to appreciate the beauty of "I touch you, I am created in you / somewhere as a complex / filament of light" (72, I Was Reading A Scientific Article) and "You are the wind, / you contain me / I walk in the white silences, / of your mind, remembering" (133, A Soul, Geologically).
I loved Owl Song, Axiom, Resurrection, and all of her poems about Circe. Although I had mixed feelings about the collection overall, Atwood has an undeniable ability to craft punchy, haunting lines: for example, "Doctor, my shadow / shivering on the table, / you dangle on the leash / of your own longing; / your need grows teeth. / You sliced me loose / and said it was / Creation. I could feel the knife" (69, Speeches for Dr. Frankenstein). I'll continue to ponder her thematic link between love and mirrors—does seeing oneself so fully as another harm or help lovers, and is it unavoidable fact? "You refuse to be / (and I) / an exact reflection, yet / will not walk from the glass, / be separate" (15, The Circle Game).
Shoutout to the man who accosted me in a park this summer and insisted I must be Canadian, even after telling him I was American, and asked if I had read Margaret Atwood. Yes, sir, I have.
I loved Owl Song, Axiom, Resurrection, and all of her poems about Circe. Although I had mixed feelings about the collection overall, Atwood has an undeniable ability to craft punchy, haunting lines: for example, "Doctor, my shadow / shivering on the table, / you dangle on the leash / of your own longing; / your need grows teeth. / You sliced me loose / and said it was / Creation. I could feel the knife" (69, Speeches for Dr. Frankenstein). I'll continue to ponder her thematic link between love and mirrors—does seeing oneself so fully as another harm or help lovers, and is it unavoidable fact? "You refuse to be / (and I) / an exact reflection, yet / will not walk from the glass, / be separate" (15, The Circle Game).
Shoutout to the man who accosted me in a park this summer and insisted I must be Canadian, even after telling him I was American, and asked if I had read Margaret Atwood. Yes, sir, I have.
May 5, 2020
Despite my high school English teacher's best efforts, I can't say that I'm very confident in my ability to evaluate/criticize poetry. I did, however, enjoy reading this over the last week or so, and I can quite happily give this collection a four-star review.
I will admit that (myself being young and probably a little stupid) some of these poems went over my head in terms of their deeper meaning and confusing metaphors. It hardly mattered to me, though, because I didn't go into this book looking to write an analysis, I only wanted to enjoy some interesting poems. Margaret Atwood writes very well, with a thoughtful vocabulary that constructs poems which are engaging and soulful. This collection probably deserves a re-read.
"We are hard on each other and call it honesty, choosing our jagged truths with care and aiming them across the neutral table. The things we say are true; it is our crooked aims, our choices turn them criminal"
"I am yours. If you feed me garbage, I will sing a song of garbage."
I will admit that (myself being young and probably a little stupid) some of these poems went over my head in terms of their deeper meaning and confusing metaphors. It hardly mattered to me, though, because I didn't go into this book looking to write an analysis, I only wanted to enjoy some interesting poems. Margaret Atwood writes very well, with a thoughtful vocabulary that constructs poems which are engaging and soulful. This collection probably deserves a re-read.
"We are hard on each other and call it honesty, choosing our jagged truths with care and aiming them across the neutral table. The things we say are true; it is our crooked aims, our choices turn them criminal"
"I am yours. If you feed me garbage, I will sing a song of garbage."
Displaying 1 - 30 of 91 reviews