The Long Home

Winner of the 11th annual Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize, "The Long Home" is Christian Wiman's first collection of poetry. The title narrative of the book is a riveting long poem from the viewpoint of a woman living in west Texas prior to the Great Depression. The story poignantly chronicles her history, from a childhood spent working in Texas cotton fields, through the life and death of her husband, and finally to the image of her grandson who "walks through walls he does not see." The beginning of his story appears to herald the end of hers, when "he waits, listening. It is all still now."

The lovely cadences in Wiman's shorter poems combine memory and emotion to bring an immediacy to the experiences within them. In "Revenant" a woman's passionate attraction to storms veils a furious death wish. The villanelle, "What I Know," merges the memory of a father's words with the emotional ties of parent and child that transcend time and death: "Some darknesses breathe, look back at you. / Under the porch a pair of eyes waits all day." Wiman's poetry is worth reading again and again. --Susan Swartwout