I remember loving her like she was my only beacon in the night years ago. I think now that she was the beginning of something that exists in its full-fledgedness to me now, but at the time, for me, was only an awareness that was stark and empty and in its infancy.

Did a review of this book here: https://youtu.be/dTTPHW7gYTw

“This is so, because human memory as a part of unfinished nature is provided/ for the experience of your unfinished existence” (25)

“The way they light the land like infrared without a trace on film, really, part of your image was linked so closely to my desire, it remained inside my body. It never reached the emotions, which tend to damage the body, but which memory requires. Thus a formal device was discovered for detailing information that was intimate and largely unacceptable to what I thought I required from you, regarding beauty in idea and form” (54).

“Not recognizing the doll would have to be something you both study, like a dead language” (62)

“Feelings of helplessness drove me to fantastic and ridiculous extremes” (84)

“Flesh that’s not suffering has form, occupying a subtle space that contains its own intuition./ inasmuch as it’s formless, it doesn’t provoke anxiety” (90)

“Atmospheric presence soaks objects” (108)

“The event of friendship opens, making afterward a field of possibility from which to begin, tenderness pre-existing” (110)

“A margin can’t rot, no bloated outline around memories of witnesses, the way origin in the present is riddled with holes” (114)

“A voice with no one speaking, like the sea, merges with my listening, as if imagining her thinking about me makes me real” (117)

“The rigor of the link is an artifact” (128)

“A friend witnessing grief enters your consciousness, illuminating your form, so quiet comes” (143)

Quietly gutsy, Berssenbrugge's poems exhude a particular strength by not just observing but embracing the subtleties of a changing social and political landscape. Tough to do when the hot-button topics of the day (any day) dominate our lives. I appreciate the fact that her poems never lose focus on the grand and slow-moving advances occurring right under our noses.

I've been reading this for months. It's brilliant, and I love her, but it's terribly difficult for me to get through (which isn't necessarily a bad thing); I've resigned myself to the fact that I may never finish it.