The Street of Clocks : Poems

Rating:
Summary: The Clocks Are Ticking
Review: THE STREET OF CLOCKS is all about aging, and by now the middle-aged author who once had the gift of youth in the palm of his hand is feeling death's nostrils breathing warm patterns of air on the back of his neck, and on even more intimate places. When you think of Sarah Lawrence and you think of "poetry" your mind stumbles on the name of Thomas Lux, for he's been there for so long that some younger students weren't even born when he started his lucrative tenure there. He can be hilarious, as when he describes humans as being the only animal who makes quotes marks with their fingers to indicate sarcasm, "bewilderment and awe." The young, in particular, warm to Lux because he sees the world from their point of view, as an infinitely strange arrangement of pleasures and tribulations, never to be exhausted.

This volume took six years to write, and it shows in the repeated thrusts and mechanical coughs of the verse style. Contrary to previous reviewers, I did not find Lux's language always specific. Sometimes it seemed vague, as though he were trying to describe dreamlike experiences or states of feeling for which language does not suffice. Have you ever read the German poet Stefan George? Sometimes, or so it seems to this reviewer, George was born again in upstate New York or wherever it was and suffered through the typical milkman's son's life until he found Sarah Lawrence the way george found his Maximin. His writing is filled with violence, like "Rommel's Asparagus," the punji-like sticks which ripped the underbellies out of enemy pilots.

All in all, he should stop it with the long hair, that makes him looks like he was part of ABBA.

Rating:
Summary: Vultures and livers
Review: This won't come as a surprise to those who know Lux's work, but *The Street of Clocks* is very good. This is, of course, also the guy who gave us "Commercial Leech Farming Today" (so much for those who say there's no new subject matter), so it always amazes me how many people don't know his work. But you should, all of you. I don't know anybody else who writes like Lux.

Describing his work, unfortunately, is more difficult than flinging around general superlatives. Often weird subject matter which nonetheless hooks into the same stuff we're all feeling: check. Unexpected vocabulary: check. But those features might be thought to equal only novelty (or at best a quirky vision appreciated only by a few isolated fellow nutcases) if it weren't for all the other stuff.

Other stuff. There's the voice, which you couldn't mistake in a thousand; in a period when an awful lot of poets sound an awful lot alike, Lux's voice is distinctive. (I'm not making this up.) That whole James-Wright-minor-melancholy tone that's so prevalent in folks coming out of workshops is absent in his poems, though it's not hard to see that Wright was an influence some way back. And there's the craft; Lux's line breaks are thought out in a way that too many poets' don't seem to be, and he manages formal verse as handily as free. (I think I'm quoting Lewis Turco when I remark that free verse isn't; and Lux knows it.) And there's the specificity which characterizes all good poets: to quote one of my favorites (from *Half-Promised Land*), "Yes!--it does, it does feel exactly fine/ crawling ashore, emptying the boots of water, and frankly/ here's to the clouds the color of bone,/ here's to the indecipherable path home,/ here's to the worm's sweat in the loam..."

See what I mean? That's sufficiently specific to crack your eardrum, with not an abstraction in the lot; and it is, believe it or not, formal verse (I read a Lux sestina without realizing what it was for at least four stanzas). And it's strange enough to make you laugh, a function which distracts you from noticing it's sufficiently (and simultaneously) poignant and celebratory to hook out your liver, a pang you notice just too late to forestall it. (Speaking of livers, there's a poem in *The Street of Clocks* with a lucky vulture in it. Now you know you can't pass that up.) And you can't imagine anyone else putting it just the way Lux does, but you know just what it means, and it makes you feel, in fact, at home. Right here. Seriously, folks, this stuff is good, and it's accessible, and people who hate poetry often like it anyhow. Buy it early and often.

Rating:
Summary: Vultures and livers
Review: Tom Lux's new book, Street of Clocks, allows its reader the luxury of a slow stroll down a familiar and comforting path. Its language is concise and uncomplicated, and its subject matter is clever, if not profound. Lux deals with such issues as fatherhood, citizenship, and personal insight without being overbearing or forceful. In fact, it is a delight to take your time wading through these thoughtful poems, like stepping into a cool fountain on a hot summer's day; be sure not to get lost in the shiny glitter that comes from some of the metallic detail of his poems, for it is sometimes blinding. This collection is many years in the making, but well worth the wait. Be sure to include this hardback in your permanent collection.

Rating:
Summary: Take Your Time
Review: Tom Lux's new book, Street of Clocks, allows its reader the luxury of a slow stroll down a familiar and comforting path. Its language is concise and uncomplicated, and its subject matter is clever, if not profound. Lux deals with such issues as fatherhood, citizenship, and personal insight without being overbearing or forceful. In fact, it is a delight to take your time wading through these thoughtful poems, like stepping into a cool fountain on a hot summer's day; be sure not to get lost in the shiny glitter that comes from some of the metallic detail of his poems, for it is sometimes blinding. This collection is many years in the making, but well worth the wait. Be sure to include this hardback in your permanent collection.