Apparition Hill

Rating:
Summary: A masterpiece of memorable imagery and lyrical clarity
Review: Apparition Hill is Mary Ruefle's seventh published collection of poetry and showcases poems completed in 1989 (some of which first appearing in such magazines as The Kenyon Review and The Michigan Quarterly Review). A master of memorable imagery and lyrical clarity, Apparition Hill continues to document Mary Ruefle as a master poet. How It Is: Things begin to burgeon. The peas go gallivanting/in their pods. That old spring prop, birdsong, wafts/through the trees, the trees with their leaves lit/like the underside of the sea. We walk deep inside/and have a picnic there. In the filtered gloss of/the forest,. pears come out of our pockets and/lunch proceeds. All this is pleasant and I will/erase it. I will erase it because the height of insanity/demands that I do. The height of insanity says we were/in a field under a festoon of clouds. The height of insanity/says I was not there. The height of insanity says/I have not had a happy life. The height of insanity/says it was snowing, insists that I say in the heaven/of February, in a porcelain snow. I will erase it./The heaven of February knows I was there, in the woods/on the twenty-second of April, eating. My hand goes/to my mouth. There is horror in my eyes. How do I know?/The martinet in a boiled shirt says it is so./Christ, I've had a happy life! But whom am I to know?