The Burning Glass

MR. DE LA MARE’S genius has its roots in the earliest English lyric. He commands the haunted music of the oldest folk-poetry, such as is well known to us in the ancient “Lyke-Wake Dirge” and the supernatural ballads. This magic, consummate in “The Listeners,” gave to that poem a disproportionate place, as though Mr. De la Mare were a “one-poem man.” Of course he is not, and this new collection abounds in incantations as evocative as ever: “The Solitary Bird,” “An Island,” “Lullay,” “Laid Low,” “The Rainbow,” “Empty,” “Joy” (which is attuned to Blake’s Songs of Innocence), and “Solitude.” In these poems and others there is some kinship to Coleridge and Poe, who also moved in that margin of twilight between meaning and suggestion.

There is, too, a group of poems, Elizabethan in tone, wherein both meaning and music, without losing the folk quality entirely, become clear voices in sunlight. Space forbids quotation, so I can but name a few of these exquisite songs, which are among the best lyrics of our time: “The Rapids,” “Ariel,” “The Summons,” “February,” “Thou Art My Long-Lost Peace.” The only modern poet who can command the Elizabethan strain with equal felicity is the Irishman, James Stephens.

Another note, that of the epigram, is well represented in this volume. At their best, the four-line apothegms recall those of Walter Savage Landor. But they sometimes fail because of a mixture of motives, when Mr. De la Mare’s associative style blurs the sharp statement demanded by this terser form. There are some longer poems in this vein which are highly successful and important: “Eureka,” a nightmare of doom as grim as Hardy’s forebodings, “The Outcasts,” an allegorical comment on the frustration of the poet and the travesty of Fame, and “Philip,” a fine piece of irony.

“The Traveller,” a long poem intended philosophically, seems to me confused beyond analysis. The problem of the aloneness of the artist, or the artistic quality in the human spirit, cannot be explained, much less solved, by hazy imagery, inconsistent symbolism, and (amazingly enough) careless technique. Let us merely pass it over, with thanks, for a collection of well-nigh flawless lyrics which will entlnall lovers of poetry. Perhaps the highest praise of a fellow poet would be in the frequency with which he exclaimed: ” I wish I could have written that!”

ROBERT HILLYER