Le Poème Invisible/The Invisible Poem
by E.D. Blodgett
Ottawa: BuschekBooks & Éditions du Noroît, 2008, ISBN 978-1-894543-47-7, 83 pp., $17.50 paper.

E.D. Blodgett has published 17 books of poetry, two of which were awarded the Governor General's Award: Apostrophes: Woman at a Piano (Buschek) in 1996 and (for translation) Transfiguration (Buschek), by Blodgett and Jacques Braul, in 1998. This collection features bilingual poems. The opening poem, "Ring," shows influence from Blake, with its echoes from "Auguries of Innocence": "To see a world in a grain of sand, / And a heaven in a wild flower."

Is it possible to make
a ring of stars
to put it on a finger
and see there the universe
as large as a hand (7)

All the poems but two--"Cherry Tree" and "Apple Tree"--are given these pithy, one-word titles. The poems themselves and their associated lines are quite short, allowing the French and English versions to appear side-by-side on the same page. But contained within are beauty and fragility like Chinese porcelain. Besides Blake, there is a definite influence from Neruda; for example, "Twilight":

The breath
of your spirit
lies on my hands
open
fully at rest

when it inhales
even the light
of the sun
grows dim (9)

That's it. That's the entire poem. A minimalist masterpiece to be housed in a museum like a Movado watch. Something spiritual whispers from these vignettes, something more felt than heard; "Tree," for instance:

The tree standing up
between your hands
is a prayer

only its leaves
know
the words (17)

There is so much more power created by a metaphor. If Blodgett had instead used a simile and said "is like a prayer," the spiritual quality of the poem would have lost. Isolating the word "know" on its own line invests it with an ontological as well as epistemological presence.

This is a poetry of the poetics of the Japanese--the satori revealed by the haiku and tanka. "Lute" is an outstanding example. It begins "A lute in suspense / my heart / opens the night" (24). We are immediately plunged into an ethereal suspension, awaiting the unwrapping of this image where the heart has assumed control of the elements, the night not unfolding of its own accord. Blodgett responds to our anticipation "overflowing / with stars / with you" and then concludes with this immaculate image:

and with a music
unheard of
where the air

appears
between two tempos
unable to choose

This is a flower unfurling its essence to the evening breeze recalling Eliot's Prufrock: "When the evening is spread out against the sky."

Not all the poems are exquisite. One of these is "Song" (32), in which the addition of unnecessary words and the appearance of a simile in the fourth stanza ruin the effect Blodgett has been so careful in creating.

Fortunately, he quickly recovers, returning us to beauty. In "Day," a day is transformed into a lake "which stretches forth / open without fear / a lake appointed // to wait upon / every passage that / the heavens grant" (65).

In turn, Blodgett has granted us an insight into the extraordinary beauty of his verse. These poems are tiny, crystal boxes that radiate light.

John Herbert Cunningham is a Winnipeg writer. He reviews poetry in Canada for Malahat Review, Arc, Antigonish Review, Fiddlehead and The Danforth Review, in the U.S. for Quarterly Conversations, Rain Taxi, Rattle, Big Bridge and Galatea Revisits, and in Australia for Jacket.

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