Fable in the Blood

by Reece, Byron Herbert; Clark, Jim

• ISBN13: 9780820323473
• ISBN10: 0820323470
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-12-01
• Publisher: Univ of Georgia Pr

Summary

Collected here are poems by one of Georgia's most intriguing and talented poets of the twentieth century. Byron Herbert Reece was born in Union County, Georgia, in 1917 and authored four volumes of poems and two novels during his short lifetime. Until now, many of his poems, originally published in the 1940s and 1950s, have been out of print. Reece, who faithfully assumed responsibility for his family's farm when his parents became ill, was never a poet of the academic ivory tower. Indeed, he rebelled against the rising New Criticism associated with the Vanderbilt Fugitives, the elite of southern poetry at that time.Reece's work reflects both the devastating impact of his parents' death from tuberculosis and his own affliction with the disease, which caused him to distance himself from others: "A solitary thing am I / Upon the roads of rust and flame / That thin at sunset to the air." Reece was also preoccupied with his ambivalence toward the farm, which sustained his solitude yet took time away from his writing: "In the far, dark woods go roving / And find there to match your mood / A kindred spirit moving / Where the wild winds blow in the wood." Reece's poetry is resonant and contemplative, and Jim Clark has included here works that speak for the true grace of Reece's talent. In addition, Clark's attentive introduction should bring increased interest to this notable southern poet.

Author Biography

Byron Herbert Reece was a lifelong resident of the north Georgia mountains. An author whose work is closely tied to the spirit and traditions of Appalachia, he wrote two novels: The Hawk and the Sun and Better a Dinner of Herbs (both Georgia). In addition, Reece was the author of four highly acclaimed volumes of poetry. Jim Clark is a professor of English and Writer-in-Residence at Barton College in Wilson, North Carolina. He is the author of a collection of short stories and two collections of poems, including Handiwork, nominated for Book of the Year by the Appalachian Writers Association.

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
Introduction	xi
FROM Ballad of the Bones (1945)
Ballad of the Bones	3	(8)
Fox Hunters of Hell	11	(3)
Lest the Lonesome Bird	14	(2)
Ballad of the Rider	16	(4)
Ballad of the Weaver	20	(3)
A Song of Sorrow	23	(1)
All the Leaves in the Wildwood	24	(1)
If Only Lovers	25	(1)
Bitter Berry	26	(1)
Mountain Fiddler	27	(2)
Invocation	29	(1)
I Am the Dust	30	(1)
In the Mind's Meadow	31	(1)
House in the Wind	32	(1)
We Shall Not Eat	33	(1)
The Harvest: 1942	34	(1)
Query in This Year of Our Lord	35	(1)
The Dawn Came Down	36	(1)
Summer	37	(1)
Whose Eye Is on the Sparrow	38	(1)
Autumn Mood	39	(1)
Year's Ending	40	(1)
Seasonal	41	(1)
I Go by Ways of Rust and Flame	42	(1)
Song after Harvest	43	(1)
Boy and Deer	44	(1)
Monochord	45	(1)
Address to the Heart	46	(3)
FROM Bow Down in Jericho (1950)
The Larks at the Meeting of David and Jonathan	49	(5)
The Crows at the Parting of David and Jonathan	54	(5)
The Remembrance of Jonathan	59	(1)
The Adoration	60	(2)
John: A New Testament Ballad	62	(5)
The Riddles	67	(7)
The Fable in the Blood	74	(3)
I'll Do As Much for My True-Love	77	(2)
Ballad of the Bride and Groom	79	(6)
The Farewell	85	(3)
The Generations of Thought	88	(1)
When First I Fared Upon the Road	89	(1)
The Travelers	90	(1)
Roads	91	(1)
Of an Old Bone I Was Bred	92	(1)
Loath Is the Leaf	93	(1)
O Where Is Charlie Langford Gone	94	(1)
The Spearmen the Bowmen the Archers	95	(1)
A Rural Air	96	(1)
We Could Wish Them a Longer Stay	97	(1)
Now to the Fields	98	(1)
The Speechless Kingdom	99	(1)
Feathers and Fur	100	(1)
Therefore the Mote	101	(1)
The Mower	102	(1)
I Looked into a Dead Man's Fields	103	(1)
In the Far Dark Woods Go Roving	104	(1)
Good-By	105	(1)
The Country Housewife Tells a Rosary	106	(1)
Gathers Again to Shining	107	(1)
Three Times Already I Have Outwitted Death	108	(3)
FROM A Song of Joy (1952)
A Song of Joy	111	(18)
The Weaver	129	(4)
The Service of Song	133	(1)
From Whence Is Song	134	(1)
A Song for Breath	135	(3)
Pandora, When We Come to Choose	138	(1)
To Market, to Market	139	(1)
If Evil Were a Little Road	140	(1)
I Know a Valley Green with Corn	141	(1)
There Never Was Time	142	(1)
The Elm and the Moon	143	(1)
My Love It Is Twain	144	(1)
Fruiting	145	(1)
The Shaggy Hills of Hughly	146	(1)
Country Autumn	147	(2)
A Certain Essence of the Sun	149	(1)
When I Think of Christmas Time	150	(5)
Three Epigraphs:
For Bow Down in Jericho	152	(1)
For Better a Dinner of Herbs	152	(1)
For Ballad of the Bones	152	(3)
FROM The Season of Flesh (1955)
In the Corridor	155	(1)
The Betrothed from the Grave	156	(4)
The Disparates	160	(1)
The Cycle	161	(1)
The Stay-at-Home	162	(1)
Fidus Achates	163	(1)
I'll Make My Love a Present	164	(1)
My True-Love	165	(1)
The Altitudes of Love	166	(1)
In Absence	167	(1)
The Haying	168	(1)
A Fire of Boughs	169	(1)
The Poet and the Vestures	170	(3)
The Minstrel Who Imagined Song	173	(2)
As I Lay Easy on My Bed	175	(2)
Underground	177	(1)
A Simple by the Sea	178	(3)
Uncollected Poems
The Tree, the Bird, and the Leaf	181	(1)
The Abstract Professor	182	(2)
The Thin Woman Upon the Road	184