The Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems, 1974–1994.

216 Pages·1995·39.028 MB·English

by  Jorie Graham

I1ARIN COUNTY FREE LIBRARY DREAM
T H
NIFIED FIELD
SELECTED POEMS
19
9 4
J
GRAHAM
JORIE
ISBN 0-88001-438-5 $23.00
9511 Ja $29.99
For
this major collection, spanning
twentyyearsofwriting,JorieGraham
has made a generous selection from her five
previous volumes ofpoetry: Hybrids ofPlants
and of Ghosts, Erosion, The End of Beauty, Re-
gion of Unlikeness, and Materialism.
In these pages we witness the maturation
and evolution of a startling and searching
poetic voice. The New York Times Book Review
described Graham's first book, Hybrids of
Plants and of Ghosts, as announcing "a poet
of large ambitions and reckless music/7
With each succeeding book, she has
enlarged the poems' reach and scope and
sought out new thematic and stylistic territo-
ry David St. John, writing in The Los Angeles
Times, recognized that, with The End of
Beautyand Region ofUnlikeness,JorieGraham
"emerged as one of our most highly imagi-
native and innovative poets." And of Mate-
rialism, he said, "[her] speculative and sensu-
al poetry echoes an aesthetic and cultural
. . .
past but is, truly, like nothing we've seen
before."
To thesizablebodyofpraiseforherwork,
James Tate has added, "Jorie Graham is a
poet of staggering intelligence. Her poems
are constantly on the attack. She assays noth-
ing less than the whole body of our history,
reshaping myth in ways that risk new
knowledge, fresh understand:hg of all that
we might hope to be."
—
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Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2011
http://www.archive.org/details/dreamofunifiedfiOOgrah
The Dream ofthe
Unified Field
Books byjorie Graham
Hybrids ofPlants and ofGhosts-
Erosion
The End ofBeauty
Region ofUnlikeness
Materialism
EarthTook ofEarth: 100 Great Poems ofthe English Language, editor
The BestAmerican Poetry 1990, editor
Graham
Jorie
DREAM
THE OF THE
UNIFIED FIELD
Selected Poems 1974-1994
THE ECCO PRESS
Copyright © 1980, 1983, 1987, 1991, 1993, 1995 byJone Graham
All rights reserved
The Ecco Press
100WestBroad Street
Hopewell, NewJersey 08525
Publishedsimultaneously in Canada by
Penguin Books Canada Ltd., Ontario
Printedin the United States ofAmerica
Library ofCongress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Graham,Jorie, 1950-
The dream ofthe unifiedfield selected poems, 1974-1994
:
p. cm.
ISBN 0-88001-438-5
I. Title.
PS3557.R214D73 1995
811'.54—dc20 95-16572
The text ofthisbookis set in Bembo
Text designby Richard Oriolo
987654321
FIRST EDITION
CONTENTS
HYBRIDS OF PLANTS AND OF GHOSTS
from
TheWayThingsWork 3
Hybrids ofPlants and ofGhosts 4
IWasTaughtThree 6
TennesseeJune 8
Jackpot 9
One in the Hand 10
The Geese 12
Mind 14
Over and Over Stitch 16
A
Feather forVoltaire 17
EROSION
from
San Sepolcro 21
Reading Plato 23
Scirocco 26
TheAge ofReason 30
Wanting a Child 35
IWatched a Snake 36
Salmon 38
History 40
Two Paintings by Gustav Klimt 42
At Luca Signorelli's Resurrection ofthe Body 45
THE END OF BEAUTY
Self-Portrait as the Gesture betweenThem 51
On
Difficulty 56
Orpheus and Eurydice - 58
To the Reader 61
Vfertig 64
What the End Is For 66
Self-Portrait asApollo and Daphne 70
The Lc ~4
N MeTangere 76
li
Self-Portrait as Hurry and Delay 80
Breakdancing 84
TheVeil 87
Imperialism 90
OfForced Sis;htes andTrusty Ferefulness 95
REGION OF UNLIKENESS
Emission 99
At the Cabaret Now
From the NewWorld 106
titled 110
The Hiding Place 112
The Region ofUnlikenc- 115
Holy Shroud 119
Picnic 122
Chaos 126