Hello Everyone!
This is the review that I had to do for a book of poems for my Creative Writing class this semester. I know that these reviews are much more academic than my reviews usually are, but I still wanted to put them up. Especially this review for Never-Ending Birds by David Baker, considering that I never read poetry. I hope that you all enjoy!
I have an incredibly complicated relationship with poetry. On one hand, poetry is a type of complicated puzzle that is satisfying to decipher. Conversely, I can read poetry and understand little more about it than the fact that it is words on a page. For me, David Baker’s collection of poems, Never-Ending Birds, was both an interesting puzzle and a source of great frustration. However, ever since we read Never-Ending Birds in class, I have wanted to read more of David Baker’s work. My interest was heightened even more when I realized Never-Ending Birds is a collection predominately focusing on the author’s struggle with his divorce. Gaining perspective and insight about my own experiences through someone else’s work is something that I greatly enjoy and as a child of divorce, I believed that I could glean some insight from David Baker’s collection.
David Baker’s collection is divided into five sections and a section of notes. My favorite poems from the collection are contained in the second and third sections. One of my favorite poems from the second section is entitled New World. Although the poem is relatively short, compared to most of the other poems in the collection, the subtitles in David Baker’s writing style shine through in New World. Certain images that Baker construct make the overall tone of the poem rather light hearted. For example, “yellow gingkos,” “blue skies” and “Autumn air” that is “warm as a bath” all sound pleasant and inviting. The light hearted tone is brief, quickly replaced by the images of an unhealthy relationship. The inviting blue sky isn’t simply blue. It is the color of a “just thrown vase.” Autumn air is warm like a bath, but a bath that, “we can say no to,” which insinuates that the narrator wanted to say no to it. There are beautiful horses that are “nuzzling in the field, in the muddy pen, in the big arces hidden by trees”, but the narrator doesn’t get to see them. However, the poem spends four lines describing the peaceful and lush environment of the horses, which makes me think that the author does want to see them, be them even. This sense of longing permeates through the first eight lines of the poem. Only in the ninth line line does it seem like the author accepts the idea of a new world. Even then, the narrator insists on remembering. “Nor will I ever forget you when the broken histories are told. Expenditure and loss. Collateral and gift.” It seems like, even though the narrator insists on remembering, the memories that he has are too harsh to remember in their entirety. Perhaps the pain of his experiences has forced him to analyze the broken world around him in the same detached manner you would use to reflect on financial endeavors, breaking them down into, “expenditure and loss. Collateral and gift.” Ultimately, rather than the narrator joyously looking forward to being able to things like picking leaves off the sidewalk or embracing the warm autumn air, the narrator enters the new world as a shell of himself, no longer interested in the beauty that the old world held. Instead, he chooses to reflect on things like wind and leaves.
The concept of a new world resonated with me in a very deep way. I have seen so many people walk away from marriages as partial humans. They have to embrace a new world that is foreign and complex. Yes, you can do whatever you want without the scrutiny of your partner. However, you built a life with another person, your whole world revolved around them, and now, suddenly, it doesn’t. People are left with years of history that do not simply disappear, but still, they move on. This phenomenon forces people to change the way they look at the world, and have looked at the world for many years. I believe that Baker captures this experience in a short and poignant manner that I both enjoyed and appreciated.
Never-Ending Birds, a poem that is in the third section of the collection, provided me with a similar experience to the one I had with New World. Essentially, Baker is writing about the little, cherished things that every family has. For Baker’s family, it was that way that his daughter referred to a large flock of birds as “never-ending birds.” Although the saying originated when Baker was still married and his family was living together, the sentiment of the “never-ending birds” never dissolved. It lived on with the memories that his family had created together even though the family dissolved.
I had a similar experience with a goodnight sentiment that my family used to have when I was younger. We used to say, “forever and always.” In many ways, it was our “never-ending birds,” a sentiment that was unique and cherished inside our family. However, we no longer use the sentiment at my mom’s house. My dad tries to keep it alive, but it isn’t the same. I can relate to the themes of Never-Ending Birds--divorce, sadness, nostalgia--some of the poem’s more prominent themes. I could also relate to the specific idea of having a “never-ending birds”-like sentiment. Until now, I have never had such a specific connection to an author’s work. It was a unique experience I hope I will have again.
Holistically, David Baker’s Never-Ending Birds is a very impressive example of modern Naturalistic literature. I will be the first to admit that I don’t think that Baker’s works are the most powerful pieces of poetry in the world. His poems about farming tools and hummer cars aren’t my favorite. In addition, I did not understand many of Baker’s references, specifically the references he makes in his emulation poems. I also do not have the same life experience that Baker does which made me feel like I had a general lack of understanding. However, I do think that Baker’s other pieces were relatively easy to understand. Ultimately, it was the poems that highlighted Baker’s evaluation and reevaluation of his feelings concerning his divorce that were the most intriguing to me. As I chose this particular collection for this specific insight, I would say that I am pleased with my selection and would consider re-reading Never-Ending Birds again in the future.
-Jaime