Page 8--Sunday, December 11, 1977-The Michigan Daily
lowell
food
(Continued from Page 3)
presentation of self. Although Lowell
gives us a portrait that is vivid, it is
at times contradictory, perhaps be-
cause of its transparency. In the year
of Lowell's birth, Yeats told us; that
poetry emerges from the quarrel
within ourselves, while rhetoric
comes from the quarrel with others.
"A poem," says Lowell, "needs to
include a man's contradictions." In
this new collection Lowell, displays
these contradictions with a force
that, when read, carries with them a
burden.
The age burns in me
The path is cleared and cleared
each year
Each year the brush closes;
nature cooperates with us
then we cooperate no more.
Instead of using conventional lyric
which tends to transcend the past and
future in favor of the present
moment, Lowell forces us to see the
sensibilities of the moment through a
knowledge of the past and future.
Nothing is hidden or left behind;
nothing is forgotten. His verse gives
us the emotional moments of a
woman, children, a landscape, an
acquaintance,an illness, a walk, a
photograph, a poetry reading, shav-
ing, dinner with a friend. But the
poet stands by almost helplessly
watching what life will become.
I ask for a natural death
no teeth on the ground,
no blood about the place...
It's not death I fear,
but unspecified, unlimited pain.
In a poem to his son, Lowell weds
the past to the present through his
consideration of an old photograph of
himself, which resembles his son's
face:
We only live between
before we are and what we were.
In the lost negative
you exist,
a smile, a cypher
an old-fashioned face
in an old-fashioned hat.
Lowell, who was once a decorative
poet, who wrote of religious myth, of
predecessors such as Longfellow,
Holmes, and Whittier, who searched
through history, has now turned to
the simplicities of life. His subjects
deal with what is immediate, with
what has been gathered from the
past into -an aging present. Still his
verse clings to the orderly narrative
that he is known to have mastered:
Southbound-
a couple in passage,
two Tennessee cardinals
in green December outside the
window
dart and tag and mate-
Since my second fatherhood
and stay in England,
I am a generation older,
We are dangerously happy-
The poems of Day by Day are
longer than most, and each contains
a coherent narrative within itself as
it moves from one still unpredictable
line to the next. Traditions are not
seen as soothing when they are
viewed through the uncomfortable,
and sometimes -unsettling perspec-
tive of this older, structured mind. In
Constance Ennis is a member of
"The Downlook," a poem which
apprehends while it concedes, Lowel
juggles realism with a meditative
focus.
For the last two minutes, the
retiring monarchy
or the full moon looks down
on the first chirping sparrows
nothing lovelier than waking to
find
another breathing body in my
bed...
glowshadow halfcovered with
dayclothers like my own,
caught in my arms.
Last summer nothing dared
impede
the flow of the body's thousand
rivulets of welcome,
winding effortlessly, yet with
ambiguous invention-
safety in nearness.
Now the downlook, the down-
look - small fuss,
nothing that could earn a line or
picture
in the responsible daily paper
we'll be reading,
an anthology. of the unredeem-
able world ...
There's no greater happiness in
days of the downlook
than to turn back to recapture
former joy.
How often have my antics and
insupportable,
trespassing tongue
gone astray and led me to
prison ...
to lying . . . kneeling
standing.,
Lowell has given up the structured
succession of aesthetic shapes that
he so faithfully wrote in earlier
years. What once came from without
now comes randomly from within.
He is dealing with tangible facts,
both mentally and physically, and in
"Epilogue," which closes the book,
Lowell says, "We are poor passing
facts." He forces us to read the
emotions of the moment, but allows
them to stretch beyond our own
selves. Perception, for Lowell, is his
conscience, and he writes by it with
obedience.
But sometimes everything I
write
with the threadbare art of my
eye
seems a snapshot,
lurid, rapid, garrish, grouped,
heightened from life
yet paralyzed by fact.
All's misalliance.
Yet why no say what happened?
pray for the grace of accuracy
Vermeer gave the sun's illumina-
tion
stealing like a tide across a map
to his girl solid with yearning.
We are poor passing facts,
warned by that to give
each figure in the photograph
. his living name.
Lowell, who was once a difficult
poet that critics analyzed endlessly,
now becomes candid, open, and
giving. His images and language now
speak for themselves. Day by Day is
a collection of poetry, which is an act
of renewal for a poet who compre-
hends the delicate pain which comes
(Continued from Page 7)
short for schlagobers) and sprinkle
with just a hint of powdered cinna-
mon. Nice to serve with a cinnamon
stick, too.
7 fluid oz. milk
1 oz. fresh yeast
4 T. sugar
4 eggs
22/3 C. all-purpose flour
1.// C. currants
12 C. sultanas (white
soaked in /4 C. rum
'2 tsp. salt
1 T. grated lemon peel
314 C. unsalted butter
1r2 tsp. vanilla
% c. chopped almonds
6 to 12 almond halves
raisins)
center. Pour in the milk mixture and
stir well. Cream butter and remain-
ing 2 T. sugar until light. Add eggs,
one at a time, beating after each
addition. Beat in milk/flour mixture.
Drain sultanas and add with lemon
rind and currants to batter. Stir in
vanilla. Cover and let stand til
doubled (105 to 120 minutes). Beat
down and put into prepared pan and
allow to rise to within 1/3" of the rim
of the pan. Place on baking sheet and
bake in center of pre-heated oven at
350 degrees for 50 to 60 minutes. If
coffee cake begins to darken, turn
down heat a bit or cover lightly with
foil. When a cake tester comes out
clean, cake is ready. Leave in the pan
a few minutes before turning out to
cool on a wire rack. Dust with
confectioners sugar and enjoy warm
with butter. Variation: While still
warm, glaze with a syrup of 3 T.
apricot jam and 1 T. rum, heated
through with 2 tsp. sugar and a
squeeze of fresh lemon. Allow to
absorb for 10 minutes and then
sprinkle with confectioners sugar.
If
A
Heavily butter an 8" Turk's Head
Mold or small Bundt pan. Sprinkle
with chopped almonds and make a
pleasant arrangement on the bottom
with the almond halves. Warm the
milk and dissolve the yeast. Add 2 T.
sugar. Sift the flour and salt into a
warm bowl and make a well in the
film
'Continued from Page 7
sion money a safer bet than the
potential fickleness of a paying
audience.
And it now seems possible that the
overdue popularization of cable TV
and its acccompanying freedom of
subject matter may indeed render
theatrical film showings obsolete.
Scheuer has tailored his anthol-
ogy to these altered times, including
as many new films as possible at the
expense of some of the older ones.
His new edition includes such cur-
rents as Star Wars, Annie Hall and at
least one film which, as best I can
tell, hasn't even appeared in theaters
yet, Billy Jack Goes to Washington.
Scheuer has spruced up his book with
such items as directors' names and
film running times, features former-
ly found exclusively in a similar
guide written by the editor's chief
rival, critic Leonard Maltin. And
while it's awfully hard not to get
metaphorically redundant while de-
scribing 10,000 movies, the Scheuer
crew succeeds quite well in holding
the film buff's interest.
S CHEUER sometimes displays a
tendency to equate newness with
excellence (four stars for Pumping
Iron and The Pink Panther Strikes
Again, for heaven's sake?!), but his
perception is largely reasoned and
rarely offensive.
Yet fun as this new issue is, I would
still recommend that true trivia buffs
hunt down one of Scheuer's editions
of the mid-'60s. That was the era of
Hercules and Godzilla - an age of
camp extravaganzas all catalogued
lovingly and hilariously by the editor
- inane masterworks largely and
sorrowfully omitted from the present
edition for want of space. And while
it's fine to be able to look up Rocky
or Taxi Driver, Scheuer'S book just
ain't the same without High School
Ceaser or Queen of Outer Space.
'sand'
(Continued from Page 3)
younger. After conquering their ini-
tial surprise at this strange twist of
time, the older Borges and his young
self settle down to discuss a few
matters. They cover both the mun-
dane and the seemingly significant,
and Borges manages to avoid the
maudlin cliche of regret for lost
youth while poking gentle fun at his
idealistic early beliefs. In discussing
a poem of Whitman's, for example,
the older Borges speculates that the
incident around which the poem
revolves probably never occurred.,
Young Borges is stunned. "You don't
know him!" he exclaims, open-
mouthed. "Whitman is incapable of
telling a lie."
The works in this collection are so
diverse that they defy easy categor-
ization; suffice to say that they are
never boring. Fans of the author will
be surprised at the inclusion of a rare
Borges love s'tory, as well as another
of his famous gaucho tales. There is
something for everybody here, plus a
little extra; it leads one to wish that
Jorge Luis Borges would write
forever.
Tom O'Connell is an associate
editor for the Daily Sunday Maga-
zine.
inside:
AT LAST
Fditor' nowe-For those who've beenaitin fu r the ans~cr tohe acrosi ic pu//Ic of NoN. I. seteuIcarned it
andhereiis:
'Backganmon is a gambling game which requires both luck and skill. With a
single roll of the dice a winning position can crumble or a seemingnv hopeless position
, can le salvaged. Luck keegs the game interesting but skillil p/aY will alwavv he
rewarded.
-Paul Magriel from Bawkgammon
Uranium hunters:
Sweeping the
Upper Peninsula
Books: Borges'
latest melange
of stories
Food
them
crois,
Supplement to The Michigan Daily
Ann Arbor, Michigan-Sunday, December 11, 1977