The new book of poems by Ann Mirabile Lees, “We Are All Seatmates on the Spaceship Earth,” is an enchanting collection written since her first book appeared in 2012. This new book contains 62 poems in five sections, plus a dedication poem.
The five sections are thematically labeled “Traveling,” “Storytellers,” “Victims,” “Dreamers,” and “Philosophers.” Lees’ new book also includes a bonus section, her 2012 poetry chapbook, “Night Spirit,” and a review of it, originally published in this newspaper.
“We Are All Seatmates on the Spaceship Earth” makes plain by its title that these poems are about a journey, the journey of life.
Some see my boat as old —
hull repainted many times,
sail a patchwork quilt,
I see it as a vessel
that has survived many storms
and still transports me carefully
past lurking reefs and shoals.
Of course, “Sonnet for a Sailboat” is not a traditional sonnet. Lees is playing with form, as she does throughout the book, mingling compassionate ironies, naturescapes, haiku, and witty ditties like “Misery!”:
A cold
has taken hold.
It’s unreal
how I feel.
Nose runny,
not funny …
In my sorry state
I wait
for immunity
to act with impunity.
Lees, a longtime Vineyarder, pursued a professional career in medical research after Harvard Medical School. She harbored a passion for writing poetry throughout her long career, and in later life she became a member of the Martha’s Vineyard Poets’ Collective and student of New York poet Matthew Lippman.
When asked which was her favorite poem in the book, Lees picked two: “Conundrum” and “True North.” There are versions of both poems in her earlier volume. “Conundrum,” which begins, “We fill the pill holder of our lives every week,” is unchanged.
“True North,” the first poem in “Night Spirit,” and the final poem in this book, has been revised meaningfully. Lees confesses to enjoying the process of revising poems, and it is fascinating to compare her two versions of “True North.”
You will find many gorgeous lines in this book, like these, from “Dreamscape”:
My skate blades carve a figure eight
on a frozen pond, shoreline
cloaked in fog that shifts
the edges with each breath of wind.
There are also ironic observations that will resonate with booklovers and dedicated readers. From “Hooked”:
A pile of books
stacked high
beside my bed.
Yet, like a fish
tempted
by a glittering lure
I explore
a bookstore awash
in more.
Please note the skillful play of musical effects in the last four lines.
Many of these poems sketch scenes familiar to Vineyarders: driving down from Boston, kayaking on an Island pond in summer, shopping at Claudia’s, skating on a frozen pond in winter, eating lunch at the ArtCliff Diner, walking along an Island path, collecting stones on the beach, watching a gull making a meal of a hapless crab. Or waiting in the Steamship Authority standby line — from “Marking Time”:
Waiting for the ferry
in a line of cars,
head resting on propped hand,
thoughts drifting
from one island of the mind
to the next …
Lees is no dreamy-eyed romantic, however. One recurring theme contrasts the lucky and well-to-do with those less fortunate and oppressed. Another key theme is mortality and our inevitable death, as we journey through a life on Spaceship Earth. This is a book rich in humanity and filled with compassion.
How can
the fortunate know
the abyss of the unwanted
refugee who has lost everything
except life, and can lose
even that on the whim
of some mad man, or fate?
As the MV Times writer Jack Shea wrote in his review of Lees’ first book, “Night Spirit,” “We come to poetry in the hopes of seeing universal truth and feelings delivered in a dialect that we speak.” In “We Are All Seatmates on the Spaceship Earth,” Ann Mirabile Lees speaks in a language we all can recognize.
