"[O]ne of the most thoughtful and adroit poets writing these days."
--The Georgia Review
The poems in Mark Jarman's thirteenth collection, Going to Sing, are lyrical expressions about the capacity of poetry to sing in many different ways, on many different subjects. Jarman, a key figure in both New Narrative and New Formalism, writes about growing up on the shore of the Pacific and also the North Sea, being formed by the faith of his family and trying to embody and explain that faith to others. Many of the poems are investigations of character in classical and literary figures (the Virgin Mary and Clytemnestra, C. S. Lewis and the Apostles); mythical and imaginary ones (the Minotaur, a mermaid); and real and contemporary figures (a widow mowing her lawn, the author's father helping his mother with a biology class, the reader trying to make sense of a poem).
The breaking surf and the owl in the egg, both are going to sing.
March lets itself out the back and hunts for a bell to ring.