{"id":2092,"date":"2017-10-23T13:53:20","date_gmt":"2017-10-23T17:53:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/?p=2092"},"modified":"2017-10-23T13:53:20","modified_gmt":"2017-10-23T17:53:20","slug":"introducing-almost-entirely","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/introducing-almost-entirely\/","title":{"rendered":"Introducing “Almost Entirely”"},"content":{"rendered":"

This November, we are adding a new title to our Paraclete Poetry collection! Look for the release of Jennifer Wallace’s book of poetry “Almost Entirely<\/a>.” <\/em><\/p>\n

Below is a preview from her blog.<\/em><\/p>\n

The title for my newest collection of poetry (due out from Paraclete Press on November 14, 2017) comes from a poem (\u201cTestament\u201d) by my first favorite poet, Hayden Carruth.<\/p>\n

I fell for Carruth\u2019s poetry 30 years ago while sitting on the floor at a local bookstore, pouring over the shelves, looking for poems that would \u201cgive me a feeling.\u201d When I read the long lines of his book, Tell Me Again How the White Heron Rises and Flies Across the Nacreous River at Twilight Toward the Distant Islands<\/em> (1989), <\/em>I admired the movement of his mind, his mysterious but down-to-earth images. I didn\u2019t know a lot about poetry and said to myself: \u201cI want to write like he does.\u201d And I literally reproduced his poems in syntax and lineation\u2014my nouns where his were, my verbs where his lived.<\/p>\n

\"\"I read his \u201cTestament\u201d many years later. At 86, while contemplating his life and reinvigorating the previously stale idea of life as hourglass, he remarks: \u201cI am almost entirely love, now.\u201d That just grabbed me. It was not envy of him for seeing himself as made almost entirely of love. Such an affirmation! An aspiration! No, I was 100% puzzled and seduced by \u201calmost entirely.\u201d How could it be? Entire\u2014as in complete, and almost\u2014as in partial. Those two in endless orbit. My poems, never quite\u00a0finished, finished by readers I never get to meet. My life, winding down, and filled with people and places I love, but also distant. My relationship with God\u2014ever present and ever elusive.<\/p>\n

Here is the opening poem from Almost Entirely<\/a>:<\/em><\/p>\n

Carruth, my first loved poet, said
\nin his \u201cTestament\u201d: Now I am
\nalmost entirely love. He
\nimagined his ego\u2019s heaviness
\nsifting through the hourglass\u2019s narrowness
\nand settling on a gatheringcone of love below.<\/p>\n

He didn\u2019t know, then —
\nthat when I lift his book from the shelf,
\nthe love he has become spills
\nlike galaxies in my hands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This November, we are adding a new title to our Paraclete Poetry collection! Look for the release of Jennifer Wallace’s book of poetry “Almost Entirely.” Below is a preview from her blog. The title for my newest collection of poetry … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-paraclete-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2092\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.paracletepress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}