Thanks to Dave Lull for alerting me to a new poem by Les Murray, "The Suspect Corpse," in the Feb. 15 issue of Commonweal:
"The dead man lay, nibbled, between
dark carriages of a rocky river,
"a curled load of himself, in cheap
clothes crusted in dried water.
"Noisy awe, nose-crimped, sent us up the
gorge to jail, in case we were hoaxing.
"Following us back down next morning
forensics mentioned his wish bone
"but never could pry any
names from between his teeth,
"not his own, nor who had lashed
his ankles, or put boulders in his clothes.
"After three months, he could only
generalize, and had started smiling."
Here are the the typically vivid images Murray assigns the physical world -- "a curled load of himself," "cheap/clothes crusted in dried water." The poem reminded me of the scene in Deliverance when they find the body of Drew (played by Ronny Cox).
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The Biplane Houses arrived last week! I find myself reading a few poems over and over: "Leaf Brims," "Twelve Poems," "The Nostril Songs," and "On the North Coast Line." I look forward to the slow reading of this wonderful collection.
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