Books-New and Old
Songs and Dreams—Even in America
Songs and Dreams. By P. M. RASKIN. The Stratford Company, Boston, Mass.
Raskin’s latest volume marks a big step forward in diction and versification. There is pleasantly lacking the false word that has marred some of his best effort in the past. One is conscious of an approach to the apt diction, fluency and:purity of the classic. Seldom has the reader the unpleasant feeling that poetic expression has been sacrificed on the altar of rhyme. There is also a pleasing variety of suitable metre. The author is breaking away from the simple sing-song forms, and is using metrical effect as a suggestive background. There can be no doubt that Raskin is within reach of that mastery of the English tongue, which, he confesses, has been his driving ambition. Were he to spend the remainder of his life in an English-speaking country, one cannot but think that he would produce much work that would endure. But one must expect to find Raskin within the next decade a citizen of Palestine, there to start all over again, for the fourth time, to master the diction of thecountry, and imbibe its spirit. This is the tragedy of the Golus, that even the Return will leave manv a vane and scar.
“Songs and Dreams” ‘is written in the simple, limpid style that Raskin has made his own. The poems are guileless and sincere. They are made up of Iyrics, ballads, and quaint philosophical conceits. The only reaction to the harsh materialism of New York seems to be an extreme of innocent idealism that rejects the merest prudence. In a similar vein, the author’s passionate opposition to war springs from outraged sentiment, and ends there.
A few extracts will give a fair idea of the quality of the work. Take, for instance:
Like two stars we deemed each otherWorlds of gold;Like two stars we found each otherFar and cold.
which to our mind might serve as a definition of poetry. There is no particular reason that one can give, but one recognizes, the product at once. “A Woman’s Tears” is a whimsical little piece that will be heard often from the platform. In “My Bride” we have an example of the old-fashioned tragic ballad, very neatly executed.
"You Left Me" has fine psychological content:
If hearts for each other will fret,No distance will wean them!If strange though together, will yetBe oceans between them.
and in “A Chance Acquaintance” there is intuitive insight into the broken soul of the under-worldling, artistically portrayed. This is one of the outstanding pieces of the volume, and strangely enough it reflects the opposite pole of the author’s world.
Raskin has not outgrown his old-fashioned idealization of nature, in which the modern poet sees the realism and even the cruelty of modern life. On the contrary, he is just as fond as ever of singing of its faultless beauties in superlatives. There is, however, a stronger note in
And I—oh, I welcome the tempestAnd scoff at the pale, frightened faces;In tempest is struggle and freedom;And sweet are its savage embraces. . .
Indeed, the new movements in poetry do not seem to have reached to Raskin. He is happy among his sweet and simple fancies
Yonder on the ground I seeSportive children gay and freePlaying circles—one, two, three,Circling round and round.
Faster, faster, merry band! At your captain's high command, Chained together hand in hand, Turn and turn around!
which rings true because there can be no doubt that Raskin himself would be found in the merry, whirling band, with hair flying and heart beating high, as jolly as the rest of them. C.
Two Jewish Poets
Europe: A Book for America. By SAMUEL ROTH. Boni & Liveright.The Coming of Peace. By JESSIE E. SAMPTER. The Publishers' PrintingCompany, New York.
Roth’s “Europe” does not look like poetry but it sounds remarkably like it. The poetry of invective, that is like a crying with pain and almost like the cursing of a madman cannot be expected to run in the conventional form. In parts, the book reeks with obscenities, but it is the obscenities and the wild cursing that give the book its unique power. The following verse may repel but we cannot fail to acknowledge the power of the feeling that inspired it:
What have I heard from you during the fifteen years in which I have been exiled from you? Once you were slaughtered by the Russians, Then by the Roumanians, Then by the Greeks, Then by the Ukrainians, } And now by the Poles— A plague on them all!
This is all I hear of you And people inquire why I go about like a madman instead ‚of enjoying the excellent landscapes of Manhattan.
Jessie Sampter’s poetry also has the ring of anger and despair, but she frames it in a form more closely adhering to the established rhyme forms than Roth. It is in her poem, “What Is Man?” that she achieves her finest passion.
Where is the deepest ruin?In the heart of Man.Broken, broken, broken.
This, too, has a beauty belonging to itself:
Is Man a tiger that he craves for his own blood?Is he an ant that he craves for his own slavery?Is not man Man?Is he not one?How shall he then devour himself,And wound himself and crush himself,And limping, madden with his blood,Go forth and tear his wife and child?Is he not mad?