Philosophical poetry that challenges

Firefly fulfils Anglo-Australian poet Kevin Hart’s longstanding desire to publish “a long book of poems each . . . in nine tercets.” The first poem “Rain,” has some challenging metaphors (“Ghost rain when poor men marry, ravens too”), serving notice that Firefly takes work to read. But it then unfolds into an engaging poem about the limits of human knowledge – even such everyday phenomena as rain eludes true understanding.

Unfamiliar histories

Philosophical themes show up. (Hart teaches theology and philosophy.) Read Firefly slowly with Wikipedia open, since Hart’s poems are often grounded in unfamiliar history and geography. His autobiographical “1954”, my favorite poem from the collection, has over a dozen historical references, including cleverly linking Ho Chih Minh to the French version of “Rock Around the Clock.”

Firefly has instances of humour. One poem runs wild with a message he saw on a malfunctioning electronic monitor, “Weather Conditions May Cause Escalators”: “Ascetics in the desert peering up, / The Ladder of Divine Ascent in hand . . . . / Only to find a staircase at their feet.” Or the gallows humor of “The Suggestion Box in Hell”: “Why not install a tanning bed in here!”

Firefly poems embrace life’s joys unsentimentally and face sorrows bravely. Death or loss lurk in the background, from the lighter “They Say” (“They say that it’s a snap when death swings by”) to the outright menace of “Mister Wolf” (“You’ve eaten all the sunlight, Mister Wolf / It’s blazing in your eyes for all to see”). The poet addresses death directly, something inevitable but not ultimately victorious. Hart’s Christian hope is understated: God, angels and saints show up from time to time but never preach.

Firefly concludes with “Flashes,” a chapter of 13 imaginative poems inspired by the fifth thesis of Walter Benjamin’s “On the Concept of History,” which begins, “The true picture of the past flits by.” Hence “The Trojan War Will Not Take Place,” because, among other things, “there’s not enough Old growth around Troy / To make a wooden mouse;” and “The New Uz,” which features a Job-inspired theme park, “archive of all modes of suffering,” complete with a boils machine, is now relocated to a Nevada desert.

Espresso for the soul

God shows up more often and more explicitly in Carnets, 600 aphorisms distributed among 12 chapters: “Once you believe in God everything praises him,” “Christ’s peace breaks us into pieces” and “We pass from likeness to likeness, not from god to God.”

Philosophy also shines: “Philosophy: running a comb through unruly ideas”; “Philosophy helps theology to be itself.”

CC readers will love this: “A Calvinist hope: The bleak shall inherit the earth.” These pithy sayings get reflection going, which is the book’s purpose: “Aphorisms – espresso for the soul.”