Michael and I share a fondness for the New England poet
Robert Francis, "a man who owned freedom and leisure," as I described
him in a former poem – a poet who subsisted on a pittance for years before being recognized as an important New England poet.
I reviewed Michael Miller's newest book of poetry, Into This World, published by Pinyon
Publishing, a few weeks ago, and before I traveled to Florida recently, Miller
referred me to another of his works, The Singing Inside, a beautiful book of poetry set by hand in 14 pt. Perpetua,
a font designed by Eric Gill. The text
was printed letterpress on a Heidelberg Original Cylinder press, and the cover
was printed by hand on a 10x15 Chandler and Price platen press. Artwork was printed from wood engravings by
Frank C. Eckmair, and the book was designed and printed by Birch Brook Press.
I describe these exterior qualities because I seldom see
such beautiful, hand-printed books of poetry.
The Singing Inside accurately
defines the poetry inside – the singing inside of a man who pays tribute to his
wife and their journey together as they mature in married love, passionately and
honestly. There are so many fine poems
in the volume that I wouldn't strike out even one as unfit for the theme of
married love, from its inception as a passionate love affair to the present
decade of their aging. Miller sings
about the latter stage of married love: "Our house is singing as it sinks/A
gradual decline with choruses/We can hear beyond the floorboards/Cracking, the
old beams creaking,/The stone foundation shifting as if/It were looking for a place
to escape./How we resist our body's aging!/Resentful of our brittle bones,/Our
muscles slackening as if asleep,/Come, let's open all the windows/And sing to
the warblers, the wrens."
I was also impressed by the cogent feelings expressed in two
exquisite love poems reminiscent of the Persian poet Rumi, on facing pages, XIX
and XX, the latter defining a love that has been plumbed and kept intact:
"We have delved into the anatomy/Of each other's darkness,/Of each other's
light,/Uncovering a grave,/Unveiling a hidden sun./We have explored without a
caution,/Reconnoitering each other's heart,/Refusing to believe there
is/Nothing left to discover."
Although Miller speaks of "maple leaves reddening and
curling at their edges," he recognizes that mature love takes
"decades of struggle/And ease to arrive at this/Three-foot wall built
with/Smooth and rough stones/Where the countries of lichen grow,/And we sit
upon it looking out/With the joined perfection of hands."
These poems are true and powerful – no frills, each word
crafted with precision, each poem condensed into tight, concrete imagery and rendered
in passionate phrasing. I read this
volume while vacationing in Weston, Florida, a city of wonderful light and felt a synchronicity of environment and the wonderful clarity and light
in The Singing Inside.
