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Sturgeon Moon, Robert LAvett Smith’s fourth collection, continues to break new ground. The book is in part a memorial to the poet’s late father, noted ichthyologist C. Lavett Smith; many of the poems, especially in the opening section, a gathering of sonnets, explore the complex and sometimes bewildering relationship between father and son. But the collection also serves to commemorate the author’s sixtieth birthday and, as such, offers a backward glance at a literary journey that now spans forty-five years. While more than threequarters of the poems assembled here are new, one section is entirely devoted to early efforts that the poet feels have continued to resonate down the decades; some of these date back as far as the late 1970s. With a single exception, none of the older poems have ever been included in a book before.
Readers of Mr. Smith’s previous work will welcome back a figure familiar from his most recent collection, the irrepressible Reverend Igneous Rock, who returns in twenty-nine new poems. There is a generous assortment of sonnets, and for the first time, there
is a section devoted to the villanelle. Once again, familiar themes recur, recast by the passage of time, and leavened by gradual acceptance: loss, redemption, and the constant struggle to find meaning in a deeply daunting world. Sturgeon Moon is a complex and compassionate collection that will reward multiple readings, and the range of subjects and styles offered here show Robert Lavett Smith to be a poet who continues to grow and develop while always remaining conscious of the ways in which all of our lives
are rooted in memory and shaped by the past.
