The Creation

This collection, winner of the 1993 Ohio State University Press/The Journal Award, is a gracefully lush reverie on matters of earth and spirit. Beasley meditates imaginatively on the theme in poems that sound the tone of prayers and vespers; elegies; re-envisioned biblical and classical mythology; more concrete personal reminiscence (``Going Home to Georgia''); seasonal observations, spiritually tinted (``Summer''); and essays in poetic form about longing, the fear of God and other subjects. The poet evokes states of loss, need and confusion with poignance, and his characterizations of looming figures are striking for their intuitive leaps and resolutions. A glimpse of God: ``There's something / that watches us, & hoards its desire, / remote / from whatever it needs.'' A message to someone who has died: ``There are times when you need / your death, / that quenched pain, the white / heat of bearing yourself / without any body.'' Beasley's softly wandering lines, ebbing and flowing as if with the drift of thought, help to bring the spiritual close to a physical fulfillment. He shares what he knows as our fellow traveler, and not as a guide who would like to find acolytes. (May)