500
PARTISAN REVIEW
poetry man ages to be at once iconocl astic - go ing "beyond the
li m it" - a nd traditional.
T he reasons why the Los t Ge nera ti on grew suspicious of big
words in the Wes t were enha nced ma nifold under Russ ia n condi–
tions. O ne of the lessons R a tu shin skaya has learned from her great
p redecessors is how to circumvent direct sta tement by allusion or
assoc iati on .
Poem
13 is a d a nce o f images fl ashing up an open
fi rep lace, fie ry horses galloping in open spaces , a little furry
creature's paws, a ta il d rawin g monograms in the a ir, a kitten in the
snow, a nd the da rkenin g glow of coolin g embers.
Poems
17 and 25,
with thei r di squieting images - with ho rses wading "up to their
ches ts in spring" and with the joll y clang of a ncient ba ttl es bursting
on the sad contemporary scene - could be brought toge ther under
the title "M arch Is the C rueles t M onth. "
Poem
25, espec ially, is
mas terl y, showing once more the poe t's control of her medium :
prese nting her scene o f ve rn al fe rmenta tion under the constell ation
o f the Virgin , she builds up the mood to a boiste rous bolt of a
steed - "bri d les can't res tra in torn lips" - onl y to end up with the
res igned coupl et, "And then , hav in g succeeded in nothing, we'll onl y
wave a ha nd, / bu t that ha nd's no longe r a ha nd , a nd V irgo gives a
laugh." Fin a ll y,
Poem
38, which is a n epipha ny o f Russ ia, shows us a
poe ti c persona wrestlin g with a bli zzard ; wa tching what will come
ou t ali ve, when the drunken torpo r is ove r , from the unpeopled
vastness o f the la nd ; a nd concluding th a t Ru ss ia n a ngels "like spar–
rows in a cold snap / become frozen towa rds dawn / a nd fall to the
snow from the wires." But the bes t lines, pe rha ps in the whole
volume , are the opening ones o f thi s poem , which I would suggest
transla ting as "The bli zzard , heated to a white glow, / has branded
us with the image of Ru ss ia ."
PAUL DEBRECZENY
THE HAW LANTERN. By Seamus Heaney.
Farrar, Straus
&
Giroux.
$12 .95.
In "Ars Poetica?" a n essay in hi s
1978
coll ection
Bells in
Winter,
Czeslaw Milosz warns tha t "poems should be writ te n rarely
and reluctantl y , / under unbearable duress a nd onl y with the hope /
th at good spiri ts, not ev il ones, choose u s for their instrument. "
