
Stags Leap" Sharon Olds stunningly poignant new sequence of poems tells the story of a divorce embracing strands of love sex sorrow memory & new freedom. In this wise & intimate telling
- which carries us through the seasons when her marriage was ending
- Sharon Olds opens her heart to the reader sharing the feeling of invisibility that comes when we are no longer standing in loves sight; the surprising physical passion that still exists between a couple during parting; the loss of everything from her husbands smile to the set of his hip. Olds is naked before us curious & brave & even generous toward the man who was her mate for thirty years & now loves another woman. As she writes in the remarkable title poem When anyone escapes my heart / leaps up. Even when its I who am escaped from / I am half on the side of the leaver. Olds propulsive poetic line & the magic of her imagery are as lively as ever & there is a new range to the music
- sometimes headlong sometimes contemplative & deep. Her unsparing approach to both pain & love makes this one of the finest most powerful books of poetry Olds has yet given us."