We need but a few pages of Distance to see he’s lingering in the shadows here, too. But here his duty is less to protect than to inform, and inform he does in a voice sheer but centered:
A woman sleeping with one hand
inverted to her breast
is signaling direction to a place
that may never be reached,
a way of saying
This is the way, but
You cannot get there from here.
Now, many a poet shares what he sees, and many a poet bores us with pretense. Watson manages to side-step tedious reporting and conjure pieces that stand not proud, but confident in their purpose. And what that purpose is depends partly on us. As I read them I sense Watson the security guard, sharing things I need to know.
The hand we perceive as waving
knows neither hello nor goodbye,
nor the difference betweenM
departure and a woman sweeping
the hair from her eyes.
Distance comes across as a sort of prism proper for Watson—taking in the whole spectrum of theme, world, vibrant love, and even the poetry sleeping inside us, and fanning it colorfully into the 41 works it comprises. While it is easy to see here the Chinese and Japanese Zen poets he cites as influences, he also deftly infuses these works with an emotion and intimacy recalling Neruda, Jack Gilbert, and the more local Jude Nutter. The pieces themselves take a variety of forms. Some show up as short, meditative pieces, as structured free verse, fragments, and even prose poems. Regardless, they always manage to retain their structural integrity, knowing instinctively when to end and let the white space begin.
So I encourage you to find The Distance Between Two Hands. Listen to what lies in that space. Appreciate, as I do now, that there is a poet out there making his rounds, keeping watch, and sharing what we need to know.
- Michael Gause