Former Warner resident Brad Marion has recently written his third book of poetry titled The Forest for the Trees. Marion’s writing embodies a crisp, classical style. He explores a range of topics with a New Englander’s soul, from the seasons and snow to love and our relationship with God.
The Forest for the Trees is organized into six parts: “The Ardor and the Appetites”, “Magdalen’s Hair”, “The Forest for the Trees”, “The Well”, “The Trick to Falling” and “Soup du Jour”. As carefully crafted as his book is, one can enjoy the poems reading them at random.
Brad Marion writes in the liner notes “Sometimes one needs to pull back in order to see more. We were not designed to be technological beings. We were meant to live in the natural world, just as trees are. We may wish to pass through the world with such a footprint. That way involves ‘seeing the forest’ and becoming the forest, for the lofty pines and oaks were designed to root into the land and to spar, to breathe, to bear fruit, to sway in the wind, to give homes to creatures of this earth, to lay down again and give their gift of life in a process that perpetrates a living forest.”
Even with all of the forest as metaphor thoughts that Marion expresses, the vast majority of writing in The Forest for the Trees mentions neither forests nor trees. Much of the book chronicles Marion’s meditations on living a contemplative life, balancing his inner journeys with daily routines and experiences. In the poem “Morning and Mists Walk” he writes “I am a man who has been baptized / By many sacred mornings, who listened / Hearing what I could a dreaming / Blessed in the dreams rising from this earth.” Yet in “A Familiar Phrase” he traverses territory we have all experienced – having a song stuck in your head that you can not get rid of. “Just as a joke I’d put on one of those / Stupid pop jingles that’ll drive you crazy, rattling around / Reminding you of how empty your thoughts really are.”
Poetry is just as relevant to our daily lives in 2010 as it was 50, 100 and 1,000 years ago. Poetry is an invitation to express the inexpressible, to capture small moments or grand truths on the page. Brad Marion is a folk poet and reminds us that words are gifts and tools, that we can’t leave poetry to the ivory tower world of academics or scholarship, it is meant to be a living presence in our daily lives. The Forest for the Trees is published by Dudley Laufman’s Wind In The Timothy Press and is available from www.windinthetimothypress.com.
If Intertown Record readers would like to share poetry for review or inclusion in the Warner Neighbors blog, please email me.
