Atlas of Wolves by John Macker

Atlas of Wolves by John Macker
atlas
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By g emil reutter
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John Macker is not a poet to make you laugh, he is not a poet to perform his poetry in such a manner as to void its serious implications for John Macker is a poet grounded in decades of lineage arriving at his current destination. Atlas of Wolves consists of strands of words flowing across pages into the darkness of life brightened by the moon, measured by history and acute awareness by the poet of his surroundings.
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First Stanza of Border Wall Blues:
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When not speaking in tongues
its soullessness borders on the devout.
From the top of the wall, we’re out of range
of anything animated or proselytizing
from the top of the wall
there are no degrees of separation
from the heat
the desert is a fever dreamt graveyard and
the wind is alive with hymns.
The wall wages a war of insurrection
on the landscape
dispossessed javelin mothers cry at the moon
rattlesnakes sell death rattles
safe for children without homes.
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The words sing from the page of the wall, separation, heat, graveyard with hymns, of insurrection, of mothers crying at the moon and rattlesnakes selling death rattles. The poet links the strands of desperation into imagery so profound to enable the stanza to cause an immediate reaction within the reader.
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The first stanza of winter poem provides fresh imagery although in a dark setting revealing the reality of life:
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Driving through winter fog
it’s difficult to see
a raven peck at the lost movie
in a coyote’s
frozen eye
that last saw the morning
star, a hawk
kiting, an anxious flock of
cedar waxwings
or the world’s wounds
tombs or bombs
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The poet creates landscapes with words in the section titled, Still life and Border Crossings. He pays homage to winter and the moon in the second section, In Praise of Winter’s Essentials and sings to us in the third section, Gorge Songs.
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These are poems of truth without need for explication, woven with imagery and metaphor. One can say that Macker has joined his beloved moon and ever expansive glory of the stars in the dark sky.
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g emil reutter can be found at: https://gereutter.wordpress.com/about/
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