River inside the river Three lyric sequences

Review by Booklist Review

*Starred Review* Orr's collection consists of three sequences of poems. Eden and After retells the biblical creation story, piquantly shifting its climax from the temptation and the eating of the apple to the couple's first lovemaking ( With their embrace / They chose / Each other / Which is / To choose death ). The City of Poetry envisions all human community and history as an agglomeration of poem-houses; fittingly, it describes the dwellings of many specific master poets and recalls constructive incidents in Orr's own poet's life. River inside the River replies to the fall of Adam and Eve with the redemption of the Book / that is the resurrection / of the body of the beloved, / which is the world. Binding the sequences together is love, of course, which we manifest in words because All we have is words, ever since God cleared His throat / And spoke. Though as erudite, as full of allusion and citation, as the work of any other poet full of the history of his craft, these poems are as straightforward in expression, as plain in vocabulary as any strict literary modernist could wish them to be. Moreover, their music and imagery constantly conjure the aura of Chinese and Japanese classical poetry. They're exquisite and earthy simultaneously.--Olson, Ray Copyright 2010 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Library Journal Review

God isn't the hot breath of summer. He isn't even a warm creative spirit. As Orr (How Beautiful the Beloved) sees Him in "Eden and After," the first lyric sequence here, God is a doddering old man. He's not an old poet (which might suggest a lustiness of spirit) so much as a stiff academic with an arthritic mind: "prohibition gave Him pleasure," and His favorite word seems to be "no," while "Eve Liked to say 'Yes' " ("To No/To Know"). Although "Eden and After" is arguably the best of the three sequences here because it offers a mythological context, the other two sequences, "The City of Poetry" and "River Inside the River," contain several deeply evocative poems. Showcasing Orr's creative, somewhat comic take on life, the poems in "River Inside the River" are light musings that Orr usually builds to a vivid ending. Some of the poems here are autobiographical, for example, "I Killed My Younger Brother," which recounts the seminal tragedy of Orr's life when at age 12 he accidentally killed his eight-year-old brother in a hunting accident. VERDICT Although a few of the poems seem somewhat derivative, especially those alluding to other poets, overall Orr's work has a haunting, Zen-like quality that speaks both on and off the page.-C. Diane Scharper, Towson Univ., MD (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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