Infidelities (Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize Library) - Softcover

In this impressive, skillful first collection, Paschen assumes roles and dons masks to explore varieties of infidelity. Assuming multiple personae (daughter, sister, gun moll, sophisticated lover) and speaking in voices that are not always distinct, Paschen explores inconstancy from shifting vantage points: "The married man calls me a master/ of contradiction, telling how I love/ to alternate my point of view." Ranging from fantasy ("Love Spell" is a fierce supplication, reminiscent of ancient remedies, enlisting the help of burning myrrh to "make him unable/ to sleep with any other") to the repetitive, rhyming, lyrics-like lines of "Torch Song," these poems feature a strong female voice doing its best to articulate hard truths about love and betrayal. Most successful, however, are the poems exposing a child's view of the drama enacted by betrayed/betraying parents; in these works, which are grounded in a particularity often lacking in other poems, vulnerability softens the focus and lends shading and depth.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

12 East Scott Street
Adultery At The Ritz
Angling
Behind The Door
Between The Acts
Bombs
Confederacy
Confirmation
Diving
Eden
Falling Through Snow
Graffiti
House Through Leaves
Hunger
'i Will Leave You In Possession Of The Field'
Incantation
Jury Duty
Laurel
Love Spell
Mobile
Moving House
My Father's Cross
My Father's Gun
'new Moon: Or I've Lost My Boat - You Shan't Have Your Hoop'
Oklahoma Home
On A Plane Flying Down The Coast Of Florida
The Other Mother
Passage
Passage Ii
Red Lanterns
Salt Marsh
Salvage
Sams Ghazal
Solitude
Stealing: 1. The Heist
Stealing: 2. The Pocket
Stealing: 3. Keepsake
Taxi
Terminal
Torch Song
Two Standards
Voir Dire
'woman Dreaming Of Escape'
-- Table of Poems from Poem FinderŪ