Hamesh Wyatt reviews recent works of poetry.
Rogelio Guedea (translated by Roger Hickin)
Otago University Press
Rogelio Guedea has written more than 50 books of poetry, essays and one of the top five best-selling novels in Mexico.
Guedea spent 11 years as the co-ordinator of the Spanish programme at Otago University.
In his latest collection of poems he once again signals his substantial potential in two languages to the reader.
This is a tale of two people: domestic, familiar and compelling.
Roger Hickin translates poems of genuine, personal intimacy. XX begins:
They say that memories are small clouds
that break up in the wind
or round soap bubbles a pin can pierce,
but in reality they’re steel mesh
or strong planks
or even concrete sidewalks
on which we can walk unperturbed,
solid floors that support us. …
Guedea is a voice scorched by experience, while the poems range from stark to stormy. This one illustrates grim, heart-wrenching honesty.
Adrienne Jansen
Landing Press
Roll & Break is Adrienne Jansen’s fourth book of poems.
This one has its origins in Titahi Bay but recognises we are all close to the sea here in New Zealand. The beach is part of our family history.
A violinist plays in a dinghy, Van Gogh is painting boatsheds and a World War 2 gun emplacement is designed to protect crucial radio communications.
Jansen wonders what would have happened if the Germans or Japanese had attacked. 1915 ends:
…
The boy squints knowingly at the horizon.
‘Europe!’ he says, ‘I’m going to Europe.
Imagine that. I’m going to Europe.’
She puts her hand onto his arm,
the tough deceptive weave of the sleeve.
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘You’re going to Europe.’
The sand crunches, gulls patter,
the sea surges in ridges and trenches,
spilling over into itself, all the way,
all the way from here to Europe.
In Roll & Break you hear the consolation of a beautiful voice delivering a well-built poem, cold truth rising from it like fog off dry ice, solid gold.
Joanna Cho
Te Herenga Waka University Press
People Person is Joanna Cho’s debut collection.
Cho was born in South Korea and currently lives in Wellington.
There is lots of fun and dramatic power in this intense little book.
It is an exciting proposition that waves a finger at the reader.
From I’ve Seen Space Jam But I Still Don’t Get Basketball:
…
I take a book when I go to his games.
He finds this offensive but I don’t see what the big deal is.
I still watch him
as he wipes the soles of his shoes with his hand
to remove the dirt and as he throws
the ball down the sand-coloured shine and as he jumps up high
to intercept, get in the middle, demand full attention
which wouldn’t happen off the court.
I don’t know why I’m picking at my lips...
This one is playful, experimental and downright weird.
Alice Te Punga Somerville
Auckland University Press
Alice Te Punga Somerville wrote three standout pieces in 2014’s Puna Wai Korero: An Anthology of Maori Poetry in English.
It has taken a while for this Wellington-born, Auckland-raised poet to put together her debut collection of poems.
Over the years Somerville has researched and taught Maori, Pacific and Indigenous text.
Always Italicise is effortlessly intense and brooding. The whole thing is slow-building, relentless and consistent. Rakau:
We know that carvers coax something or someone
Who’s already there in the wood
They remove small pieces of timber, one by one; until it’s ready.
We both know a language is waiting inside my tongue.
Please put down the adze, the skillsaw, the file
Speak gently to me so I can recognise what’s there.
No, don’t chip away at pink flesh and taste buds:
Oozing and swollen, I will choke on my blood before you’re done.
The wood you’re trying to carve is still a tree.
Somerville in this one found the perfect space between bliss and oblivion.
Helen Jacobs
TuiTwo Publishers
Withstanding (2016) was called a powerful final collection from a much-loved Canterbury poet.
Six years and another couple of books later, 93-year-old Helen Jacobs is still writing. Covid-19, daily life, Russia’s war on Ukraine, all get an airing.
Jacobs uses short phrases and lots of looking back. She knows how to be thoughtful and inspiring. Keeping Faith:
I must walk every day.
I should walk every day.
I intend to walk every day,
keeping faith
with my walker.
Some of these poems may be cheesy, but for someone who has been around forever, they are entertaining. She has already battled all her demons.
Hamesh Wyatt lives in Bluff. He reads and writes poetry.
