Sunday, January 31, 2021

RE-READING LYLE GLAZIER ~





" You be Harry Glazier's boy, bean't ye?"

 

Sugaring Off


Easter vacation

  he tramps the Gutter Road

      from Gramp's to Uncle Maurice's

  where the whole family's sugaring


Lynn and Orman and Calvin

  trip metal caps off buckets

      under spiles

  draining the sugar bush


Merle bossing the gathering,

  tub slewing, team

      straining, bobsled runners

  grating on a ledge


Perry shoves another slab

  in the firebox

     "a gallon to the barrel, boys,

  get a move on!"

      Maurice tips the dipper, testing


In the kitchen Aunt Pluma

  boils down a batch for

      fancy sugar cakes:

  stars, hearts, scaled fish


Loyce and Thelma spoon snow

  from a dishpan into ie pie plates

      the thick glaze pulls at the fork

  "a little goes a long ways"



_________________________

Lyle Glazier

Prefatory Lyrics

Coffee House Press, 1991



___________________________________


It was the poet and editor Cid Corman

who had the great ear and tenacity to

promote, publish and persevere

so many fine back country poets —

be it Gary Snyder's early book of poems

Riprap, or Lorine Niedecker's entire workbook,

Theodore Enslin's musical memory, and gone into

the bushes forgotten Lyle Glazier's tramps in the sugar bush,

and this is a mere touching of the Corman radiance.

So few could restore that moment of lyrical movement

and visual care as Lyle Glazier works his tablet in

Prefatory Lyrics.


[ BA ]