Customer Reviews

God's Silence

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O man o man o man. I just finished with my first reading of this collection. How many poetry collections do I struggle to finish, have no interest in rereading? Maybe 5-10 a month. I not only relish the prospect of rereading this book, but I want to memorize lines, whole poems. He writes in the tradition of Herbert, Smart, R. S. Thomas, maybe with flashes of those writers, but Wright here is all himself. And he is accomplished here. His voice and lines are genuine, compelling, given with authority. His story is hard one. Lovers of the sly wink and chuckle of the ironic, those appalled that feeling and belief might be present, those who are quick to belittle without being able to offer any real alternative vision, won't enjoy this book. Nor is this book in the tradition of Collins or Dunn or any of the other 'pick up basketball is the metaphor of the suburban middle aged poet' school. This book is the reason to read poetry--claiming something on the page which is consequential, pointing toward something greater.

Franz Wright is the kind of poetic voice that rises once in a hundred years. That such titanic figures can come dangerously close to oblivion is apparent through his alarmingly slow rise to notoriety--but perhaps this speaks more to the American public's increasing ignorance of the medium's importance.

With "God's Silence" Wright expands his already masterful craft and allows us to see a little bit more into his vast mind than ever before. His apparently genuine spiritual enlightenment is elaborated on, far more so than in "Vineyard": "The day's coming/when I will no longer consider/my mere presence inexpiable/I will place my hand in that flame/and feel nothing/I will ask nobody's forgiveness again/Or I just go among people no more.." ("Reparations", pg. 9). Wright has some very black humor in this joy of a collection, a quality one would certainly not have expected from him before.

Wright is an odd mix of Merton, Trakl, Clare, Bacovia, and other irreconcilables. His unification of the sacred and the depraved is undeniably authoritative. You really have to read this guy to understand the magnitude of the poet we have walking and breathing (isn't that unusual?) among us. A must.

Franz Wright is a stunning poet who communicates how hard it is to live one single life and who is filled to the brim with raw emotion and compassion for the living and the dead. His lucid poems display grief, fury, love and unbearable tenderness, and Beckett-like hilarity, too: "(I was always the death of the party.)" The poems speak directly to us - intimately, honestly, urgently - with a fierce intelligence and deep spiritual grace.

"When Moses conversed with God, he asked, 'Lord, where shall I seek You"
God answered, 'Among the brokenhearted'." Abu'l Fayd Al-Misri

Franz Wright prefaces his book of poetry "God's Silence" (2006) with the above quotation which aptly summarizes much of the content of the book. Wright (b. 1953) won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize in poetry for his collection "Walking to Martha's Vineyard". He is the son of the poet James Wright who also received the Pulitzer Prize. I came across "God's Silence" while browsing in the local library, and it is my first experience with Wright's work.

The poems are in a highly confessional, personal style. The poet meditates on his experience with addiction, alcohol, and depression, together with a painful childhood. The tone of the poems are alternately sad, angry, or caustic. The poetry also evidences an intense religious faith which is Catholic specifically but more accurately described as mystical. The poems move from a transcendent vision to a vision in which God is immanent to the everyday world of sorrow and suffering. At their best, the religious poems of this volume are profoundly moving. Wright acknowledges the writings of Abraham Joshua Heschel and Thich Nhat Hanh as "constant sources of illumination and companionship" during the composition of the book.

The book is divided into four sections and consists of over 140 pages which is lengthy for a volume of poetry. Most of the poems are short. It is written in a free verse style with short lines which frequently spill over into long, running sentences. There are two translations included and two brief prose poems. The personal, confessional tone predominates at the beginning of the collection and gradually becomes overtaken by religious meditation. There is a strong sense of suffering and wrongdoing, as the poet frequently speaks in the language of forgiveness and repentance. The book makes great use of the metaphors of light and darkness, sound (and music) and silence.

The title of the book, "God's silence" is itself a key metaphor used in several of the poems. In "The Hawk", Wright imagines himself as coming back to life in the form of a hawk "my gold skull filled with nothing but God's will." But he gives up this hope for the human, finding that "I am changing; this three-pound lump/of sentient meat electrified by hope and terror has learned to hear/His silence like the sun, and sought to change!"

In a lengthy poem called "Arkansas Good Friday", Wright returns to the figure of the sun and God's silence. Describing how he clings to the "Before, the infinite" in the midst of his pain, Wright says:

"I have heard God's silence like the sun
now I long to return to it
no matter my infantile clinging
to this gorgeous material of such early wisteria and lilacs ....
And I can add I found this world sufficiently miraculous
for me, before I'm changed."


In a poem called "The Walk" the poet feels that "the void was shining". He hears "God's silence like the sun" before stumbling into a church where he hears the "faceless voice saying" "How can you expect energy from above/when you continue to receive it/from below/and are content?"

Finally, in "Wake", the poet finds that his deceased friend "looked like he was doing fine There" while "Everyone else in the room looked just awful." As a result of the experience he concludes again "I have heard God's silence like the sun/ and longed to/change/And one way or another I was going to."

Some of the poems in this collection reminded me of Wallace Stevens. Here is a short poem called "The Reader" which concludes the second part of the book.

"The mask was gone now, burned away
(from inside)
by God's gaze.

There was no
I, there

was no he--
finally

there was no text, only
what the words stood for;
and then

what all things stand for."

There is some eloquent, heartfelt writing in this book together, unfortunately, with wordy, banal passages that do not work well. The book grew on me as I read it. The book coheres as it moves forward, and I think it best to read the poems in the order in which they appear and in a single sitting, if possible. With some awkward less than impressive moments, this book does ultimately convey the quest for spiritual meaning in the transience and suffering of daily experience.

Robin Friedman

Walking to Martha's Vineyard was my first introduction to the writings of Franz Wright. Since then, I have read all of his other books because I enjoy and identify with his writing so much. With that said, God's Silence, continues where Martha's Vineyard left off.

Wright won the Pulitzer for Martha's Vineyard, but I honestly believe if this book would've been published earlier in his career, this might have won it for him. It's that good!

The poems are honest, inspiring, ironic, brutal yet beautiful and never boring. Often, when I am reading a book of poetry I have to force myself to finish it. Definitely not the case with Franz Wright or this book. I actually find myself rereading it, always discovering new gems I didn't pick up on the first read through.

Here are some examples of Wright's genius:

1. from Progress- "I was always the death of the party/In a way that leaves/a scar, I/no longer wish to love

2.from Scribbled Testament- "I stand before you/here,some hairy/primate's fall from grace/one of the patients of God/one of the orphans of light."

3.from The Heaven- "I lived as a monster, my only/hope is to die like a child."

This is truly a great poet. The depth and the leaps of conciousness are far beyond any poet that I know of. This is not easily accessable ideas being communicated. Mr. Wright is expressing a realm of feeling and associations not usually witnessed in print. Truly orginal and at the same time paying homage to the great legacy of poetry. Mr. Wright suffers greatly in his life and in his production of his art form. I hope that he does get some satisfaction and contentment from his final product.

These are lovely poems that will enrich the reader who invests even a little time in getting to know them. Wright's insights into life are unique and at times challenging, often encapsulated in just a few short lines. Worth the effort.

...collection of appallingly bad poems one wonders how they were accepted in the first place and why the reader (this reader anyway) was left feeling so disappointed, so let down to the degree i will never buy let alone bother reading franz wright's 'work' again. best to spend money on another poet and give this one a wide berth.