Collected Poems

""My life is mine to have well or to lose,"" writes Bowers in this impressive collection, which marks a 40-year career (For Louis Pasteur, 1990; The Form of Loss, 1956) in which the poet has set his own course in defiance of trends. Bowers assumes a sophisticated audience aware of high culture and history, both of which he incorporates gracefully in a manner that is organic rather than self-consciously allusive. The poems often speak of memory, of history and of their overlap. Although his work runs the risk of seeming too restrained, Bowers usually avoids this trap with a bit of striking imagery. And he is capable of lovely passages: ""In the pale winter day the hills are pale/ Shades of more color than there is alphabet."" The poem ""Jacob"" provides a fine example of the beauty, confidence and depth of Bowers's work: ""Years up the ladder of the sky, beyond/ Air, fire and water, a jet plane barely moved,/ Marked on the blue as on the final stone-/ Feather, leaf, shell, fish-print or whitened bone."" Were his stanzas architectural elements, they would surely be Doric columns. His poems combine purposeful structure with forceful rhythm. (Feb.)