borealis by jeff humphries reviewed in the nature pages

	Borealis by Jeff Humphries woodcuts by Betsy Bowen University of Minnesota Press, 2002
	Lumbering satyr grazes near the shore; may sink entirely out of view when swimming, then emerge like Bottom, bestial fairy-charmed dream of the lake enfleshed: fatulent, slack lipped, sad-eyed, receding chin....
	The poems in this collection by Jeff Humphries express the primal nature of life in the "North Country" of northern Minnesota, a place inhabited by moose and frogs and beaver and wolves, and the occasional voyageur. Aptly illustrated with woodcuts by Betsy Bowen, each verse illuminates the essence of an animal or plant or human event.
	Like the North Country itself, this collection is mostly made up of poems about wild creatures, rare and common, like martens and lake trout and song sparrows and porcupine. There's also a longer poem, "The Drowned Man," which is not so much about a tragic event as a tale about a fisherman losing himself in the deep, cold waters of wild introspection: This is nothing but the skin of the instant, time's pelt, and we, he thought, are nothing but its entrails, but he was so wrong, for there is nothing within it, no in to its out. He leaned, to see himself better, and fell in.		Also by Jeff Humphries A Bestiary Reading Emptiness: Buddhism and Literature

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~