Coming on the heels of the Poets Against the War
anthology and Web site effort, and of Hamill's stepping-down as the founding editor of Copper Canyon press, this valedictory volume feels perfectly timed. It includes work from 13 collections, as well as new poems, and a variety of translations from Chinese and Japanese classics. Hamill is at his best working in a minimal style inflected by his reading: "Each act of affection a lesson:/ I fail, but with each lesson, learn.// Like studying/ under Te-Shan:// Thirty blows if I can't answer;/ thirty blows if I can." The translations, which open the book, include work from Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu and Wang Wei, as well as Issa, Ryokan and Basho. One of them, a short verse by Saigyo (1118–1190), sums up the book as a whole: "The mind is all sky/ the heart utterly empty,/ and the perfect moon/ is completely transparent/ entering western mountains." (Mar.)
