Visible Signs : New and Selected Poems

by Raab, Lawrence (Author)

• ISBN13: 9780142002698
• ISBN10: 0142002690
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2003-04-01
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)

Summary

A poem by Lawrence Raab is a carefully chosen and precisely rendered moment--a poised and elegant meditation on the nature of memory. This new collection includes a selection from each of Raab's five previous books of poetry, as well as twenty-one new poems. Readers will delight in their wide-ranging subjects, from "Miles Davis on Art" to "Saint Augustine's Dog," from the inventions of Rube Goldberg to the recklessness of dreams.

Author Biography

Lawrence Raab is professor of English at Williams College, and his poems have appeared in such magazines as Poetry, The New Yorker, The Paris Review, and The Nation. He is the author of five previous collections of poetry.

Table of Contents

New Poems
Why It Often Rains in the Movies	3	(2)
In Dreams	5	(2)
Inside the Chateau: A Pornographic Story	7	(2)
The Invisible Hand	9	(2)
Some of the Things My Mother Said	11	(2)
Miles Davis on Art	13	(1)
My Father Drives Away	14	(1)
Letter	15	(2)
Tarantula	17	(2)
Vanishing Point	19	(1)
Winterset	20	(2)
Small Ghost Poem	22	(1)
Talking to the Dog	23	(1)
The End of the World	24	(2)
Dark Matter	26	(2)
Camouflage	28	(2)
Damage	30	(2)
Saint George's Dragon	32	(2)
Rube Goldberg's Flower	34	(2)
Saint Augustine's Dog	36	(1)
Request	37	(4)
From Mysteries of the Horizon
The Rules, the Story, and the Way Out	41	(1)
Voices Answering Back: The Vampires	42	(2)
Magritte: The Song of the Glass Keys and the Cape of Storms	44	(2)
To Lorca	46	(2)
Seven Charms for a New Day	48	(5)
From The Collector of Cold Weather	53	(24)
Visiting the Oracle Water	55	(3)
The Assassin's Fatal Error	58	(2)
Attack of the Crab Monsters	60	(2)
Doctor Watson's Final Case	62	(2)
The Blue Histories of the Wind	64	(13)
From Other Children
A Night's Museum	77	(1)
What We Should Have Known	78	(1)
For You	79	(1)
Two Clouds	80	(2)
A Familiar Story	82	(1)
On the Island	83	(2)
Scene from a Novel	85	(1)
The Witch's Story	86	(2)
Night Song	88	(2)
The Room	90	(1)
Cold Spring	91	(1)
Listening to a Certain Song	92	(2)
Other Children	94	(13)
From What We Don't Know About Each Other
A Crow	107	(1)
What We Don't Know About Each Other	108	(3)
Lies	111	(2)
Learning How to Write	113	(2)
The Shakespeare Lesson	115	(2)
The Bad Muse	117	(2)
The Sudden Appearance of a Monster at a Window	119	(1)
What He Thought About the Party	120	(2)
The Uses of Nostalgia	122	(3)
Happiness	125	(2)
Magic Problems	127	(2)
Daily Life	129	(2)
Stories in Which the Past Is Made	131	(2)
At Evening	133	(2)
Marriage	135	(1)
What I Forgot to Mention	136	(1)
The Secret Life	137	(10)
From The Probable World
Why the Truth Is Hidden	147	(2)
Love	149	(2)
Respect	151	(2)
American Light	153	(1)
A Small Lie	154	(2)
All Day	156	(2)
The Lost Things	158	(1)
Why Tragedy Is the Wrong Word	159	(1)
Years Later	160	(3)
In the Garden	163	(1)
"My Soul Is a Light Housekeeper"	164	(1)
Great Art	165	(2)
Another Argument About the Impossible	167	(1)
Hunters	168	(1)
Permanence	169	(2)
My Life Before I Knew It	171	(2)
The Invisible	173	(2)
The Pole	175	(1)
Fragile	176	(2)
Emily Dickinson's House	178	(1)
False Nocturne	179	(2)
The Questions Poems Ask	181	(2)
My Spiritual Life	183	(1)
The Best Days	184	(1)
My Life at the Movies	185	(3)
Vanishing	188