Intimacies of Sound; Poems by David Jaffin
Shearsman Books. 216 Pages.
Available through Small Press Distribution.

Just returned from a great 5 a.m. bike ride to the central post office in Shin-Urayasu! The heat hasn’t set in yet. Trucks and taxi cabs on the roads, mostly. An old man fishing by himself in the river as I crossed over the bridge. Lots of jungle crows out scouting from the tops of buildings and wee black birds threshing the lawns in the parks–where early rising residents are taking their dogs for their morning constitutional. And the beautiful sound of the summer crickets–suzumushi, the Japanese call them–rising up from the weeds! Usually the sound of traffic drowns them out, but at this hour I hear the one sound that draws me back to my earlier life in Nagasaki and Fukuoka prefectures.

But to the business at hand: David Jaffin has got to be one of the most prolific of the marginal poets (meaning, literally, poets who write poems as commentary in the margins of their books, or on the “margins” of the music that they hear or of the art that they see. “Marginalized” is another good word for Jaffin, who’s lived in Germany for most of his creative life, just as Cid Corman spent a good part of his existence on the frontiers of English in Japan.) In the space of one year Jaffin (as he refers to himself in writing and conversation) has produced three books that I know of, all published in Germany under the aegis of Shearsman Books, U.K.

I haven’t had a chance to read through the whole collection, but will share with you a “handful” as Cid would say:

Mussorgsky/Janacek’

s rough-

hued called-
out music

Veined from
running

stone’s light-
celebrat-

ing.

Some masterpieces in the Kassel museum (5)

a) Asnath (from “Jacob’s blessing” Rembrandt)

almost sub

missively
thoughtful

Ringed in the
circling pen

siveness where
all those je

wels seemed so
subdued

from touch.

b) “Man with a hat” (Hals, 1660)

Rough-

edged hand
s slouched

hat Angled
face between

pose and a
certitude

in-glanced.

c) Italian aristocrat (Titian, 1550)

The dignity

of man’s triumph
over primieval

forces Straight
ened to a

height of self-
satisfying

stance with an
almost cosmic

assurance
Costumed thor

oughly through
in red.

d) Jacob and the blessing (Rembrandt)

the aged

ness of Is
rael’s suffer

ing selection
And the bless

ed youth al
most angeli

cally curled
in to a bright

ness for futur
ing hopes.

c) Elsbeth Tucker (Durer, 1499)

There were

more pattern
s about her

than that
boned-in

Eye-search
ing view could

possibly be
signifying.

Along with poems about culture and culture-heroes and heroines we find delicate responses to nature such as this one:

Rain-drop window

these tiny-

touched-
sounds of

that slight
edged-in

percept-
ing

I musologiz frhe lack of accent marks! This programming doesn’t allow me to use them, so I ask my readers to please “think” them in place!

While we’re at it, I’d like to give a big thumbs-up to Tony Frazer’s Shearsman books and Shearsman Magazine! Always filled with high-quality poetry on the cusp of the cutting edge! More about this on-going venture soon.

Now to crawl back into the futon for a few more winks before the day really begins!