I Love Artists is a selection of poems. None of them are new, save the last four. All of them have the same scientific brushstroke feel. Very clearly they are about something specific, but the language leaves holes in the explanation. That's intentional, or if not intentional, then a known aspect of the poems. Berssenbrugge says so herself:
When I find a gap, I don't fix it, don't intrude like a violent, stray dog, separating flow and context, to/conform what I say to what you see.
I Love Artists is a selection of poems, few of them are new. Since the poems are grouped by what collection they originate from, they flow very nicely into each other. Once a section ends, however, there is a brief shudder in the machine before it continues along as is. The poems fit together like a waterlogged jigsaw. There are gaps.
If we take a step back and look at the whole of this selection, we can just make out a figure. He's inside many of the poems, but only just. A shoulder here, a leg there, sometimes even his silhouette (although his features remain obscure). He is shaped like a partner, or a feeling, or a place. He is vaguely masculine only in that he is ever referred to as he or him. He's in the picture, but just out of frame.
I have to wonder if Berssenbrugge has someone in mind. If the poems are for her and her alone. But then, there are still the gaps. Who the figure is and what they might look like are never said, but we can fill in the blanks for ourselves. Maybe the figure is literal, and in your life there is some omnipresent he. Or maybe the figure is an emotion, one that you are constantly chasing or being chased by. Between the gaps in these gentle, mechanical poems, we are invited to make for ourselves a bit of art.
I Love Artists is a selection of poems. They don't always seem to fit, but there is a figure inside them. The words are written like those of a biologist in love with life. They are accurate, but they still let us ask more questions.
I Love Artists might tell a story, but
I don't care about the story, look, so much as, what do you think of her? Do you like her?
Berssenbrugge, Mei-me. I Love Artists: new and selected poems. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006. Koller-Collins Collection, PS3522.E77 I15 2006
