NONFICTION

Quickening Fields

Penguin Pr. Jun. 2017. 128p. ISBN 9780143131328. pap. $20; ebk. ISBN 9781524705060. POETRY
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OrangeReviewStarThis newest volume of poems from Rogers (Holy Heathen Rhapsody) continues her journey as a poet of nature, an observational writer whose work is deeply rooted in poems about God, the earth, and its creatures. Not a religious poet per se, she is a writer who finds God in reflections of life, human or otherwise, whether she speaks of family or chasms of ice or the sun after it rains. "Who is it who makes music/ with falling stars of water? Who is it who/ tunes the art of benevolence?" Rogers's language can be crisp and specific or languid and luxurious, whether she speaks of polar bears or winter camping or stars congregating in a mountain lake. "They are ancestors/ of transfiguration, intimate with all the eyes/ of the night. What can they know?"
VERDICT What readers will know throughout these poems is how deeply Rogers sees, how humanely she views the world above, below, and the spaces that reside between her. "Still …catch that ring/ of blossoms, lift it up, wear/ its beauty…. Look into a mirror./ See what you can see."
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