Poetry Review #Summer21

In ‘An Ear for Poetry’, published in Poetry in 2015, Julian B. Gewirtz and Rachel R. Kolb discuss the limitations of cliched metaphors of the senses and remind readers that language can offer us so much more: “Becoming more inclusive in our metaphors and our vocabulary for talking about poetry does not mean stripping away the richness and texture of our critical vocabulary. Rather, it points to the possibilities of expanding it.” Oliver Sacks wrote in his book Seeing Voices: A Journey into the World of the Deaf (1989): “It is all too easy to take language, one’s own language, for granted – one may need to encounter another language, or rather another mode of language, in order to be astonished, to be pushed into wonder again.” To become the fortune teller, to see the song, we need to remake language every time.