{"id":4634,"date":"2018-07-01T14:51:01","date_gmt":"2018-07-01T18:51:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/?p=4634"},"modified":"2019-09-10T19:58:06","modified_gmt":"2019-09-10T23:58:06","slug":"bullet-and-poem-without-suffering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/2018\/07\/bullet-and-poem-without-suffering\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cBullet\u201d and Poem without Suffering<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Discussed in this review: \u201cBullet,\u201d David Byrne, American Utopia, Nonesuch, 2018; Poem without Suffering, Josef Kaplan, Wonder Books, 2015<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

David Byrne\u2019s earworm takes a distant yet close perspective, describing a bullet\u2019s fatal encounter with a human body. Did he know about Kaplan\u2019s similar short, rapid, book-length poem? Byrne\u2019s song sets its sights on an adult man, Kaplan\u2019s poem on a child. The life of the child is hinted by describing what a warm maternal relationship is like, and by mentioning injuries from falling off a bunk bed and being hit by a baseball. We hear about the man\u2019s life because of what the bullet cuts through: \u201cSkin that women had touched,\u201d \u201cMany fine meals he tasted there,\u201d \u201chis heart with thoughts of you.\u201d The general description is very effective. There are striking metaphors \u2014 positive associations \u2014 for the bullet itself, also. In Poem,<\/em> it is a triumphant runner (such as Usain Bolt, who bears the name of a crossbow\u2019s projectile) dragging gore from the body as if it were a trophy or banner. In \u201cBullet,\u201d it is \u201cLike an old grey dog \/ On a fox\u2019s trail.\u201d Perhaps America\u2019s reliable old dog cannot be taught new tricks.<\/p>\n

American Utopia<\/em><\/a> \u00b7 Poem without Suffering<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

David Byrne\u2019s earworm takes a distant yet close perspective, describing a bullet\u2019s fatal encounter with a human body. Did he know about Kaplan\u2019s similar short, rapid, book-length poem? Byrne\u2019s song sets its sights on an adult man, Kaplan\u2019s poem on a child. The life of the child is hinted by describing what a warm maternal … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “\u201cBullet\u201d and Poem without Suffering<\/i>“<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[16,18,14,4],"class_list":["post-4634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-1k","tag-books","tag-music","tag-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4634"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4792,"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4634\/revisions\/4792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nickm.com\/post\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}