Negative Blue : Selected Later Poems

Rating:
Summary: Welcome to Paradise
Review: It's interesting to see what Wright has done with this long-awaited third installment in his Dantesque trilogy. NEGATIVE BLUE is subtitled SELECTED LATER POEMS, but in fact it includes nearly everything from the last three books. There are a handful of poems excluded from CHICKAMAUGA, BLACK ZODIAC is reprinted complete, and only one poem is excluded from APPALACHIA. Also, there is a fine (and sometimes funny) concluding sequence of new poems, "North American Bear," which cements the book's relationship to the Paradiso.

Wright can sometimes drift into opacity, but on the whole these are fascinating poems about his three favorite subjects: language, landscape, and the idea of God.