In a Dark Time … The Eye Begins to See

Luckily I had read several poems by Bruce Weigl in an anthology of 90’s poets before I read on the internet that he is often classified as a Vietnam War poet. Despite the fact that I served there about the same time he did, I generally avoid writers who write about the war. Although I [...]

In my last entry I commented that I wasn’t interested in reading poetry that dwelled on the horrors of Vietnam or on literature that just portrayed the horrors of child abuse. I want the books I read to go beyond the simple revelation of such horrors. I expect them to inspire me or, at [...]

As I’ve read Bruce Weigl’s Vietnam poems, I have begun to realize just how difficult it is to accurately convey the feelings of soldiers who fought there. Part of that difficulty stems from the simple fact that not everyone experienced the same war. Obviously Weigl’s experiences, or at least the ones described in [...]

I don’t know if I’ve ever bought a book of poetry because of poems I’ve read in an anthology and had those poems turn out to be my favorite poems in the book. But the Weigl poems I first discussed are still my favorite poems, but I like them even better now because I understand [...]