Human Rights

Book by Lease, Joseph

This first collection by a Tufts University professor declares its demanding aesthetic right at the start: decrying ``narrative'' and ``ambition,'' the poet of ``Michael Kohlhaas''his reimagining of Kleist's novellafavors ``metaphor'' and ``visual arrangement,'' and Lease adheres to this stringent, surreal notion in numerous poems that seem to be little more than collages of arresting images. Lease tries to redefine the relation between emotion, object, and word in love poems that sweat and climax but make no conventional sense, and in the cascading prose of ``Words Like Rain,'' language simply splashes over things, as elsewhere it records random colors or, worse, devolves into self-reflexive writing about the fear of writing (``The Room''). Lease hopes to create a myth and ritual of his wordplay, repeating phrases and sentences in different contexts, seeking liquid meanings. When he does break form and speak straight, the result is often lame``Sometimes our egos are prize-winning hogs,'' he laments at a party; or, in a modern shopping mall, he imagines that the ethnic world of his ancestors was somehow more ``real'' (``Slivovitz''). Lease excels when hes ``just trying to understand this instant''a not altogether original poetic creed these days, but one nevertheless that disguises his bland insight. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

The welter of well-crafted poems in this first collection reflect a potpourri of structures and aesthetics pinched from the postwar avant-garde. From staccato verse ("What you fear came true/ Years ago./ Families fill and empty") and related lean, Creeley-like poems, to earthy biographical and autobiographical prose works, Lease's poems reflect thoughtful lineation and a good ear. There's even sarcastic, brand-aware work that resembles the witty cant of language poet Ron Silliman: "And now we are expensive too, we own 14.99. Your arm so free, like a firefly or a work center." Walking the line between formal diversity and an impersonal melange of styles, Lease musters a consistent emotional honesty that is exceptionally sharp when dealing with the running theme of thwarted lust and personal failure, with many poems featuring a man naming his loneliness or his surprise at his life's trajectory. (That Lease is editor of the Boston Book Review suggests some successes too.) Lease may not have found his mature voice in this debut, but lyrics like the third section of "Apartment" hint at things to come: "To believe in words spoken// by an angel;/ to worry about the angel's/ intentions. To open// smoothly, like a hand."
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.