Abstract
The epigraph in poet Jean Valentine’s book Break the Glass: “A pencil / for a wing bone” (by Lorine Neidecker) leads us to consider the way writing allows for transcendence. Similarly, in her work, Meta Kusar brushes out stars with a comb and then finds “an accomplice / combed / in this hollowed-out place…” From the two countries US and Slovenia of such vastly different sizes, these poets, both influenced by such luminaries as Emily Dickinson and Marina Tsvetaeva, have carved out intimate spiritually enriching spaces where consciousness meets the sublime. Focusing on Kusar’s view of Heraclitus as a teacher who “understood invisible strings are stronger than visible ones,” I will explore the thematic, literary and stylistic connections between these two literary stars, as well as some of their differences in how they cultivate a poetics of the invisible that illuminates the mysterious underworld of the human soul as it negotiates the political, philosophical and ethical realms of contemporary existence.
Highlights
Noise abounds in the streets, in technology, in the media, in the political rhetoric
Meta Kušar in a recent interview in The Bridge of Voices refers to Heraclitus as her teacher “who understood that the invisible strings are stronger than the visible ones” (Carlson and Jackson 78)
It is through these strings that Kušar and American poet Jean Valentine’s voices create a space as intimate and spiritually enriching as it is vast
Summary
Noise abounds in the streets, in technology, in the media, in the political rhetoric. It is through these strings that Kušar and American poet Jean Valentine’s voices create a space as intimate and spiritually enriching as it is vast Jean Valentine introduces her book Break the Glass with the epigraph by Lorine Neidecker: “A pencil/for a wing bone” (3), leading us to consider the way writing allows for transcendence.
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