Arched Eyebrows and Kiva: 2 new chapbooks by David Appelbaum. Reviewed by Laurence Carr
Arched Eyebrows and Kiva (2024): 2 chapbooks by David Appelbaum (published by Cyberwit.net) a review by Laurence Carr)
I’ve read David Appelbaum’s writings over the last 25 years. Poetry in every form, prose poems, essays, memoirs, nature studies and his more layered philosophical works. (David is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at New Paltz.)
Over coffee at one of our favorite haunts, he unexpectedly handed me his two new poetry chapbooks, Kiva (43 pages) and Arched Eyebrows (30 pages). At once, I thought, two chapbooks instead of one? And— two chapbooks rather than combining into one longer volume? Interesting. I then flipped through both to see what poetic forms David was playing with. The poems were short, broken lines, most of them no more than three to four words. With hardly any punctuation: a few question marks, dashes and ellipses sprinkled throughout. Stanzas of one or two lines, numerous triplets, and occasionally quatrains. What was he up to?
When I got home, what I thought would be a fast-paced read guided by the short-line form became a more meditative study. (The literary joke has always been: “Shorter poems are harder to write than longer ones.”) Poet Appelbaum has written a series of thought-provoking mini-essays (“Advertising” P9, Arched Eyebrows), art and nature observations (“Burning the Tree” P33, Kiva) and personal recollections (“Party P29, Kiva) to name a few. Each is a stand-alone piece, but when read in sequence or by randomly choosing poems here and there, the two books create a narrative that brings all these pieces into a unified experience. The reading pace may be quick, but the resonance slowly builds and deeper thoughts accumulate. Both books have the same publication date, 2024. But which came first? If we get lost in these weeds, we can ponder another chicken and egg theory, but why bother? We have two chapbooks in conversation with themselves and with us. Prequel and sequel? Or simultaneous creations? The main thing is that here are 2 new volumes before us, a gift from writer to reader.
I was intrigued with many of the poems ending in questions. The writer does not offer definitive answers anywhere in the books but often poses questions. This can keep the poems active in the reader’s mind long after the last line is read.
I’ll quote two of the poems here in full, the first from from Kiva:
Venus at Willendorf
chunk of slag hips, an ancient goddess
proof scoria alone is fertile enough
to people thoughts of rebirth—
what isn’t someone else’s metaphor
for living a life unhad
never prayed for never dreampt
really felt?
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And a poem from Arches Eyebrows:
Afterlife
Does the sun really Have rays (radii)
Above us behind us Eternally to fret
In glints we can’t Conceive
Glancing off The face of delight
Like a Farmer’s Almanac Sketch
Warming chilling freezing A barren house
Where the soul was believed To live
And go ‘where’?
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It was refreshing to read these collections of short line poems. There was no attempt to write in prose and then break lines to shoehorn the pieces into poetic forms. The lines here (or combinations of lines) are terse, pointed and ultra-economical . Not one syllable is wasted. And with that, we can meditate between the lines and also at the end of the pieces. The writer is not telling us what to think—but is encouraging us to think outside the poems.
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Reading these two chapbooks made me delve (re-delve?) into David Appelbaum’s other books. Two earlier poetry volumes specifically utilize this short line form throughout: Window With 4 Panes (2009) and Simple With (2023). Several other books are in prose, investigating myth, science and religion. A 2017 volume, notes on water: an aqueous phenomenology, is a study of how water creates our oneness with nature. Reviews of writer Appelbaum's works: Collector of Lapsed Time (2024), a series of prose poems that explore the dance between time and humanity and two poetry volumes, Portuguese Sailor Boy (2020) and The Spindle Tree Euonymous, can be read here in Lightwood. (Use our Search Button.)
I invite you to read these two chapbook offerings: Arched Eyebrows and Kiva. Interesting in themselves and wonderful steppingstones to more of David Appelbaum’s writings. And please read the Lightwood reviews of other books by the author. He is a writer whose works stimulate both the mind and heart of the reader.
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David Appelbaum has a long and prolific career as a writer, publisher and educator and is the founder of Codhill Press. An author of numerous books, articles and poetry, his recent poetry/prose poem collections are Collector of Lapsed Time (Black Spring Press Group (2024); Simple With (2023 Cyberwit.net); and collections of personal essays: Evidence of Place, On Personal Geography (Codhill Press, 2023) and notes on water: an aqueous phenomenology (Monkfish, 2018).
Read more of David Appelbaum’s poems and book reviews here on Lightwood. Go to our Search Button and enter his name and click.
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