Wilbur's 'Mayflies' shows little beneath its buzz

After a silence of 10 years, it might seem fitting for a major poet to publish a work much changed in style or tone from his previous efforts. Yet Richard Wilbur, who has twice won the Pulitzer Prize for his poems, recently came out with a new book very similar to the vast corpus of his work.

COURTESY HARCOURT BRACE After spilling coffee on the cover, Wilbur found the stain improved the original design.

That's not to say Mayflies, subtitled "New Poems and Translations," isn't an accomplished, fascinating book. If anything, the poems are clearer and more formally precise than his earlier, more abstract ones. But to say that Wilbur has added many new twists or formal elements would be an overstatement. Though his work stands as a bastion of clarity in a usually muddled poetic world, he doesn't seem to feel the need to experiment further with his style.

Perhaps one reason for Wilbur's feeling of poetic self-satisfaction comes from his reputation: he is indeed a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning poet (in 1989, for the large New and Collected Poems), as well as a translator, essay writer (best known for a series of literary essays, collected in The Catbird's Song), and critic. Indeed, the first two impulses are much in evidence in this book. Along with a series of poems in rhyming couplets, poems in quatrains, and a group of tankas, Wilbur has included here new translations of Molière and Dante. Having already done a landmark translation of Molière's Tartuffe, this rhymed, metered version of his Amphitryon is certainly welcome.

However, as the book jacket notes, "These 25 poems reaffirm Wilbur's stature as one of our greatest living masters of verse." Reaffirm, it seems here, is the operative word. Wilbur's verse, while still nearly perfect technically and often emotionally on the mark, has lost the sense of experimentation that had been present in his earlier work. His poems now deal with the clichéd frightened child ("A Barred Owl") and, more tellingly, with the fate of the university poet ("Personae"). Such a poet, though not noted as such, could resemble Wilbur himself: while "mindful of the daring lives/Of bards who dwelt in garrets," he still "ascends the platform now to read his verse/Dressed like a sandhog, stevedore, or worse" and "give[s] the brave Bohemian past its due." Poetry has become rather comfortable, even profitable.

No longer consigned to the "garret" of the unappreciated poet, Wilbur and others like him have the luxuries of university appointments, fellowships, and department chairmanships. Certainly, these luxuries bring with them a great many advantages: they allow, for example, poets who might not otherwise have had the chance an opportunity to write.

For Wilbur, however, this sentiment expresses itself in a bourgeois, slightly melancholy stance, romanticizing the past while satirizing the "worse" dress of the wealthy contemporary poet. While his comment may take a slight jab at the self-satisfied ideas of his poetic peers, by no means can his remarks be categorized as social criticism. Writing well-rhymed lines about the self-satisfaction of poets is meaningful perhaps only for himself and others in similar situations. To put it bluntly, Wilbur is no Allen Ginsberg—nor, in this reader's opinion, should he attempt to be. His attempts at outrage, meant to be humorous, fall flat when compared with Ginsberg's legitimate social concerns.

Still, other poems in the book seem incredibly well constructed: meaningful, with no wasted words. To be able to write a poem in strict rhyme about leaving ("For C.") is nearly impossible without sentimentality; still, Wilbur manages to pull it off. He speaks of a "wild sostenuto of the heart," flowery phrasing which he does not often allow himself, but which adds flavor to the usually abstract character of his poems. Stylistically, his poems are unusual in their ability to capture such abstract moments with a nearly perfect clarity of thought.

Unlike many contemporaries who are writing Ashbery-esque narrative poems, Wilbur writes work which is memorable line by line. There is much to be said for a poet who consistently has advanced his career with poems in a formal, nearly old-fashioned style. Attention to line and strict phrasing, Wilbur seems to be saying, remains a legitimate poetic concern.

In general, Wilbur's book is a must-read for someone who has never encountered his poetry. His work has made a definite contribution to 20th-century poetry and is formalistic to an unusual degree. However, for those already familiar with his New and Collected Poems, this book offers little in the way of change. Mayflies is still worth reading, but should Wilbur continue to avoid stylistic evolution, future works such as this will do little to advance his reputation.

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