Welcome to Lit Review, where columnist Dominiq Wilson will take apart a series of chapbooks to figure out what works and what doesn’t for the modern reader of poetry.

We’re starting off May Term with The Strict Economy of Fire, a 31-poem collection written by Ava Leavell Haymon. I chose to read this book because of its interesting title and soon found that it was more than just a collection.

This book acted more like a travel journal of sorts, and I didn’t realize it until I was almost halfway through the book. At first, I just noted that a lot of the poems seemed to refer back to each other, but as movement was implied within the poems, I realized that the narrator was moving from one place to another. Take “Rhododendron Forest on the Last Ascent” for example:

A rhododendron forest gathers around us,

mother thighs twisting out of the ground

amber and pink, here and there glazed

with a thin gold leaf of morning sun.

 

Earlier, Ganesh loomed over us, porcelain white,

the long ridge trending off southwest,

glaciers without pity, harsh granite the gable beam

of the world. Now this lush screen enfolds us—

 

boles the shape of human limbs, muscled legs, a peeling

skin three-colored as the sycamore we know at home.

Ferns, banj lichen pillow the rocks. Giant trunks

of hemlock, burnt out hollow, to crawl in and sleep.

 

The sprigs of Buddha plant we carry from below

encourage our climb with the smell of tangerines

and lavender. Little seed heads of hope.

We will leave them

 

at the pass, if we make it there,

at the stupa, if there is one so high,

if we can bear to leave these arms.

There were many interesting poems in this rather large collection, but I also noted a few that, to me, felt like filler poems. The majority of the poems speak about something for a lengthy amount of time, so the ones that didn’t do that, to me, could have been expanded upon or excluded. But I also understanding the nature of traveling, and excitement isn’t around every corner. In terms of following this traveling journey, I think that adding these filler poems was strategic, but within a collection of poems, I found the energy of these poems to be lacking compared to the others in the collection.

The most interesting poems I found were in a series, which there were quite a few of in this collection. The majority of them have at least two parts, but the longest series of poems is titled “First Smoke,” which has eight parts and describes the set of fires the narrator sees as they hike up a mountain. Fortunately for me, the first two parts of this series were my favorite, which I’m happy to share with you below:

i

From hazy blue black shadows, a slanting

first sun picks out creases in the earth

the homey color of pecan shells.

A thousand identical mountains—

I count the one we are on—

 

and the one next in front of us

sends up a balloon of smoke.

Too far away to show flames,

the plume billows fat and puffy,

then steadies to narrow streamers.

 

Another puff! woman’s voice behind me

in the single file. And another: Look—a third!

Who would set such fires? at such altitude,

higher than villages? The smoke slips straight up

against an indigo ground, three birthday candles

 

lit at one time. All through the morning,

the lines of white crawl sideways, stretching

to meet for ring-around-the-rosy. By noon,

the ring is complete. The birthday girl has tossed

her hoop. One peak out of all the others burns,

burns upwards, slow as an hour hand,

at this great distance.

 

ii

 

Cremation fires, Ming Mah tells us

when we all stop for lunch. This far

from rivers, the dead are carried higher

and burned near mountaintops.

The imagery of birthday candles and the reality of cremation rituals were almost a juxtaposition of events. While one event celebrates one more year of a happy, healthy life, the other is a grieving celebration for a life cut short. It’s definitely morbid in its own way, but I really enjoyed how imagination and reality clash in such an interesting way, here. I highly suggest you read the rest of the series if you have the chance!

I’ve never read a book with a timeline like this before, and I highly suggest that you read it! We have a copy in our campus library, and it’s also available for purchase on Louisiana State University Press’s website for around $17.

Welcome to Lit Review, where columnist Dominiq Wilson will take apart a series of chapbooks to figure out what works and what doesn’t for the modern reader of poetry.

Bee-Coursing Box is Matthew Haughton’s debut poetry collection, published into Accents Publishing’s Winged Series. He currently lives in Lexington, as an artist and educator, but has lived in Colorado and eastern Kentucky, which I like to think influenced the poems in this collection.

Before the poems begin, Haughton provides instructions on how to create a bee-coursing box, which I thought was really cool! It turns out that the contraption covers bees in flour so it’s easier to see the bees while they fly, which is one of the many ways to find out where a bee’s hive is. When I first read it, it seemed a bit morbid to follow a bee to its hive and take the honey from it, but the first poem in the collection that mentions bee-coursing boxes created a different scene for me. If you would like, read the poem below:

Inside I find the shell of a honeybee,

down at the bottom of the box.

 

He’s thin as my fingernail,

buried in a cup’s worth of flour.

 

I closed my eyes and imagine

the spell lifts—

so this honeybee

can rise

like Snow White

From her apple-bitten sleep.

 

I follow him, coursing on the back

of his tiny wings

until he finds a hive up in a tree.

 

I mark the tree and return

year after year;

we grow old

together,

deep into his second life.

 

But there’s no magic;

his husk says

just as I found it,

 

the last taste of honey

becomes something

like a song

or memory

for his shapeless mouth.

The rest of the poems in the collection are obviously heavily influenced by nature, and for the most part, the life within it. The majority of the poems mention animals in some way, shape, or form, but the first few that dealt with plants included “Deer Tongue: A Conversation about Tobacco” and “Tracking Seeds,” a three-part poem in the collection.

“Deer Tongue” caught my eye in a strange way, considering I have strong negative feelings about tobacco, but I noted why it was so interesting: it describes the lighting of a cigarette in such an interesting way that I reread it a few times. I also found the mentioning of a deer tongue almost as foreshadowing to what tobacco can do to your body, but that could come from my negative bias.

“Tracking Seeds” piqued my interest in the same way that it describes a process. All three poems take a position within the cycle of a seed, from its first dismantle from a wilting plant, it’s travel through the air, and where it lands. These process perspectives are ones that I never thought about, and I find them to be very interesting.

One of the few poems that I really loved is “The Lover’s Knot,” which is a narration on a hiker finding two dead snakes that were knotted together. I relate to the narrator in the way that he seems to feel bad for these snakes and how he wishes them the best life in the afterlife. I strongly encourage you to read below.

Out walking, I found

two dead snakes

tied in a lover’s knot.

Slumped in the grass,

their skins shone

like beaded copper

while flies traveled

up their lengths.

I looked at the male,

tethered to his mate.

She lay beside him,

mouth gorged open.

I left them behind,

worried all lovers

could end this way — 

in the open, without

keep or tending.

In the living wake of

things, I pray there’s

a heaven for snakes.

Their bodies coiling

round one another

in the high, cool grass.

Aside from the narrator in this poem, there isn’t much human interaction or domination with or over nature, but there is a separate series of poems at the end of the collection under the title of “Preacher Road.” This series of six poems are dedicated to the poet, minister, and activist Don West, and they tell of the road trip going down Preacher Road (or at least that’s what I assume). It starts out pretty well, and it gets increasingly eerie and strange. I won’t give away the ending, but I liked the series a lot and the ending even more.

I hope that some of you reach out to read this book! I was able to borrow the book from Professor Manning, but just like Plein Jeu, you can purchase this book on Accents Publishing’s website for $5. They are limited, so please email them to check on the book’s availability.