NICK CARBO REVIEWS REPRODUCTIONS OF THE EMPTY FLAGPOLE
[First Published in Second Avenue Press, 2003-4]
Review of Reproductions of the Empty Flagpole. Marsh Hawk Press. 2002.
ISBN: 09713332-8-9. $12.95
Reproductions of the Empty Flagpole is Eileen Tabios’ first book of poetry to be published in the United States and this volume of art-inspired prose poems should bring to an American audience what the Philippine and Southeast Asian publishing world has already known for several years: Eileen Tabios is a world class poet with serious talent. She has had three previous books of poetry published in the Philippines since 1989. They are Beyond Life Sentences (1989) which won the Manila Book Critics’ Circle National Book Award, Ecstatic Mutations (2000), and My Romance (2001).
Reproductions begins with the poem “Eclipse” which asserts the poet’s intimate connection to the world of art, “To escape chaos, the Greeks created art with abstractions. It is a familiar approach, having long used geometry to deny myself caresses.” Many of the poems in the book are inspired by works of art like “The Kritios Boy,” “Jade,” “Adultery,” “The Color of a Scratch in Metal,” “The Wire Sculpture,” “The Fairy Child’s Prayer,” “The Destiny of Rain,” “My Saison Between Baudelair and Morrison,” “Muse Poem,” “Franz Kline Kindly Says About Three Gersture-Laden Brushstrokes,” “Insomnia’s Lullaby,” and the whole last section of the book entitled “Triptych for Anne Truit.” Tabio’s approach to these poems is pure ekphrasis. In ancient Greece, philosophers defined ekphrasis as a vivid description intended to bring the subject before the mind’s eye of the listener.
The author of this book is ultimately successful in this artistic enterprise of bringing the subject before the mind’s eye of the readers and these readers will not only be enlightened but informed.
Review of Reproductions of the Empty Flagpole. Marsh Hawk Press. 2002.
ISBN: 09713332-8-9. $12.95
Reproductions of the Empty Flagpole is Eileen Tabios’ first book of poetry to be published in the United States and this volume of art-inspired prose poems should bring to an American audience what the Philippine and Southeast Asian publishing world has already known for several years: Eileen Tabios is a world class poet with serious talent. She has had three previous books of poetry published in the Philippines since 1989. They are Beyond Life Sentences (1989) which won the Manila Book Critics’ Circle National Book Award, Ecstatic Mutations (2000), and My Romance (2001).
Reproductions begins with the poem “Eclipse” which asserts the poet’s intimate connection to the world of art, “To escape chaos, the Greeks created art with abstractions. It is a familiar approach, having long used geometry to deny myself caresses.” Many of the poems in the book are inspired by works of art like “The Kritios Boy,” “Jade,” “Adultery,” “The Color of a Scratch in Metal,” “The Wire Sculpture,” “The Fairy Child’s Prayer,” “The Destiny of Rain,” “My Saison Between Baudelair and Morrison,” “Muse Poem,” “Franz Kline Kindly Says About Three Gersture-Laden Brushstrokes,” “Insomnia’s Lullaby,” and the whole last section of the book entitled “Triptych for Anne Truit.” Tabio’s approach to these poems is pure ekphrasis. In ancient Greece, philosophers defined ekphrasis as a vivid description intended to bring the subject before the mind’s eye of the listener.
The author of this book is ultimately successful in this artistic enterprise of bringing the subject before the mind’s eye of the readers and these readers will not only be enlightened but informed.
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