John Ashbery once said, to very loosely paraphrase, and I'm quite likely misquoting, that reading poetry is like getting your necessary roughage and vitamins from eating your daily vegetables. I would agree with that, but poetry does have a bit more pleasantry to it as well; an available afterglow.

With that said, I would suggest that reading Ashbery is not like eating Brussel sprouts, but like doing a few shots of bourbon. The first that goes down isn’t pleasant at all. You kind of want to shake your head with an exclamatory and question why you just put yourself through that. But than after a few more, the settling effects begin to take over. You slide into the tone. The subsuming warmth begins and you merge with rather than work against all the haphazard elements. It’s a cerebral and emotional movement that allows you to go into a different mode than the one you were in when you forced down that first poem. Unlike bourbon, it takes some effort, but the end effect can be the same.

Although, I’d still stay that Ashbery requires a prior mood that you need to be in to be receptive to his poetry. Something along the lines of , “I’m fucking dying here man! You gotta help me out!” works quite well. OK, that may be a little too extreme. So how about I throw out some descriptions that could apply to Ashbery’s writing:

ironic exclamations
transient sentimentality
plaintive meandering
lackadaisical weariness
calm awareness
discordant humor
humble negation
absurd synthesis

And when you find yourself in a mood inclusive of all of these at once, than you know its time to grab yourself some Ashbery. He’ll speak to you like no other poet can. Even if you are only embodying two or three of these qualities, Ashbery will meet you half way and the poetry will still work and bring you to the rest. But if you are in none of these modes of thinking and feeling.... well, go do your bills, rebalance your 401K, get your lawnmower fixed, diagram some sentences, whatever, because Ashbery will only be speaking from another world.

I should probably say something about this most recent collection, Planisphere. The poems are much shorter than earlier Ashbery works, including the lines, which tend to work more through their sinuous phrasing rather than blocked sentences. Another very important thing: the poems are placed in alphabetical order based upon the titles. This is important because Ashbery is known for picking up a book and begin reading from whatever page he happens to open. With this book, because of the alphabetic presentation, you’ll know exactly where you are in the book if you choose to read in this same way. I still read it cover to cover though. But that’s just me. So the fact that they were in alphabetical order really meant nothing to me. The poetry though, remained wonderful.