(Red Hen Press, 2015)
reviewed by John Pickett
In Gaylord Brewer’s new book of poems, Country of Ghost, the reader follows a
protagonist named Ghost as he deals with the afterlife that is happening right
now all around the rest of us. While the title alludes to one country, Ghost’s
travels actually take him through three: Spain, Finland, and France. The
prominent motifs and themes of the book—regrets, memories, love, loss, family,
and home—are made clear in poems with titles such as “Ghost Says Goodbye,” “On
the Pier, Ghost Finds a Love Note, Paper of Seeds, and Accepts an Invitation,”
and “Ghost Rehearses for His Funeral,”
Brewer opens the book in Spain with “Ghost Born.” We begin
with the death of Ghost and his rebirth as a spirit who still has unfinished
business in the land of the living. In “Becoming Ghost,” we are present at his
funeral where, “Your secrets mean nothing to anyone now,” and Ghost himself
seems to forget that he’s actually dead as he “breathes on for awhile—sorry
nostalgia, so breathe.” It’s as if Ghost is fighting for relevancy and his life,
and Brewer makes this fight one of the central themes to the book.
Also central to the book is the question of what happens in
the afterlife? “Where are you going?” the narrator asks at the end of the poem,
and then answers “Where you have arrived, of course,” as if the answer to the
movement of Ghost is already predetermined. Ghost doesn’t take this answer
lying down as he continues on as a spirit, as he continues doing the things a
living person would, as in “Ghost Takes the Evening Bus, Briefly Dozes,” “Ghost
Holds His Vow of Fasting for Nearly Twelve Hours,” and “Ghost Bleeds.” In
“Ghost Takes the Evening Bus, Briefly Dozes,” we see Ghost
[…] work
the crowd, seat to seat
lap
to lap, so exquisitely exhausted
you’re
sure of truth in each,
And near the end of
this particular journey to a destination that Ghost himself doesn’t name,
but by sight, he writes, “Next stop, perhaps one after / that’s yours. Don’t worry—you’ll / surely
know when you see it.” Ghost is merely a tourist in his own memories, but he longs
to do something about it. For a person that’s dead, Ghost certainly lives on.
Brewer’s tone through these pieces is melancholy, but with a
wink and a nod to a hope, even in the direst of situations in which Ghost finds
himself. There are no fixed patterns here in the structure of the poems. Much
like a ghost, Brewer roams where he wants to with his phrasing. In the
aforementioned “Ghost Rehearses His Funeral,” Brewer is almost staccato in the
first stanza:
Leave
candles unlit, the field’s
bouquet
unharvested, book of
scripture
closed. Unbutton shirt
and
trouser.
Later on in the work, the syntax opens:
Lie
now on the black down
of
your bed-giving pillow,
still
room, last rites of silence.
Cross
hands loosely one upon
the
other, where the heart lived
its
urgencies and desires.
Brewer’s work leads readers to be more mindful of their own
travels and day-to-day existence, more aware of the subtleties and the finer
details of life. Country of Ghost is
essentially a travel companion of a life once lived and lived again. Though it
moves through well-tread themes, it travels well. Brewer’s Ghost is more real,
more complex than our moaning, white-sheet stereotypes. Ghost regrets,
particularly when his wife shows up from time to time in pieces like “Ghosts
Says Goodbye,” where he looks at a photograph and remembers “Your wife, your
home, the man you meant to be and became instead.” But before the end, Brewer again
offers a hopeful sliver:
And
yes, if there were a ghost
of
a chance for one blessing more,
deserved
or otherwise […]
John Franklin Pickett, III, received a BA from Florida State University’s Creative Writing Program and is currently a professor at Northern Virginia Community College and National Defense University. He has work forthcoming in Apalachee Review this fall.
John Franklin Pickett, III, received a BA from Florida State University’s Creative Writing Program and is currently a professor at Northern Virginia Community College and National Defense University. He has work forthcoming in Apalachee Review this fall.