{"id":702,"date":"2010-06-07T17:45:00","date_gmt":"2010-06-07T17:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=702"},"modified":"2016-04-19T10:26:55","modified_gmt":"2016-04-19T10:26:55","slug":"penelope-shuttle-reviews-whistle-by-martin-figura","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/penelope-shuttle-reviews-whistle-by-martin-figura\/","title":{"rendered":"Penelope Shuttle reviews &#39;Whistle&#39; by Martin Figura"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><meta name=\"Title\" content=\"\"><br \/>\n<meta name=\"Keywords\" content=\"\"><br \/>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><br \/>\n<meta name=\"ProgId\" content=\"Word.Document\"><br \/>\n<meta name=\"Generator\" content=\"Microsoft Word 2008\"><br \/>\n<meta name=\"Originator\" content=\"Microsoft Word 2008\">\n<link rel=\"File-List\" href=\"file:\/\/localhost\/Users\/helenivory\/Library\/Caches\/TemporaryItems\/msoclip\/0clip_filelist.xml\">\n<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>\n <o:OfficeDocumentSettings>\n  <o:AllowPNG\/>\n <\/o:OfficeDocumentSettings>\n<\/xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>\n <w:WordDocument>\n  <w:Zoom>0<\/w:Zoom>\n  <w:TrackMoves>false<\/w:TrackMoves>\n  <w:TrackFormatting\/>\n  <w:PunctuationKerning\/>\n  <w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing>18 pt<\/w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing>\n  <w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>18 pt<\/w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>\n  <w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>0<\/w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>\n  <w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>0<\/w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>\n  <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas\/>\n  <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false<\/w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>\n  <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false<\/w:IgnoreMixedContent>\n  <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false<\/w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>\n  <w:Compatibility>\n   <w:BreakWrappedTables\/>\n   <w:DontGrowAutofit\/>\n   <w:DontAutofitConstrainedTables\/>\n   <w:DontVertAlignInTxbx\/>\n  <\/w:Compatibility>\n <\/w:WordDocument>\n<\/xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>\n <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState=\"false\" LatentStyleCount=\"276\">\n <\/w:LatentStyles>\n<\/xml><![endif]--><\/p>\n<style>\n<!--\n \/* Font Definitions *\/\n@font-face\n\t{font-family:Arial;\n\tpanose-1:2 11 6 4 2 2 2 2 2 4;\n\tmso-font-charset:0;\n\tmso-generic-font-family:auto;\n\tmso-font-pitch:variable;\n\tmso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;}\n \/* Style Definitions *\/\np.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal\n\t{mso-style-parent:\"\";\n\tmargin:0cm;\n\tmargin-bottom:.0001pt;\n\tmso-pagination:widow-orphan;\n\tfont-size:12.0pt;\n\tfont-family:Arial;\n\tmso-ascii-font-family:\"Times New Roman\";\n\tmso-fareast-font-family:\"Times New Roman\";\n\tmso-hansi-font-family:\"Times New Roman\";\n\tmso-bidi-font-family:Arial;\n\tcolor:black;\n\tmso-fareast-language:EN-GB;\n\tfont-weight:bold;}\n@page Section1\n\t{size:595.3pt 841.9pt;\n\tmargin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt;\n\tmso-header-margin:35.4pt;\n\tmso-footer-margin:35.4pt;\n\tmso-paper-source:0;}\ndiv.Section1\n\t{page:Section1;}\n-->\n<\/style>\n<p><!--[if gte mso 10]>\n\n\n<style>\n \/* Style Definitions *\/\ntable.MsoNormalTable\n\t{mso-style-name:\"Table Normal\";\n\tmso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;\n\tmso-tstyle-colband-size:0;\n\tmso-style-noshow:yes;\n\tmso-style-parent:\"\";\n\tmso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt;\n\tmso-para-margin:0cm;\n\tmso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;\n\tmso-pagination:widow-orphan;\n\tfont-size:12.0pt;\n\tfont-family:\"Times New Roman\";\n\tmso-ascii-font-family:Cambria;\n\tmso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;\n\tmso-fareast-font-family:\"Times New Roman\";\n\tmso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast;\n\tmso-hansi-font-family:Cambria;\n\tmso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;\n\tmso-bidi-font-family:\"Times New Roman\";\n\tmso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}\n<\/style>\n\n\n<![endif]--><br \/>\n<!--StartFragment--><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\"><font size=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: bold;\"><\/span><\/font><\/span><font size=\"2\"><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\"><span style=\"font-weight: bold;\"><\/span><\/span><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\"><span style=\"font-weight: bold;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.arrowheadpress.co.uk\/books\/whistle.html\">Whistle<\/a> by Martin Figura,&nbsp; Arrowhead Press 2010<\/span><\/p>\n<p>When Martin Figura was a ten year old boy, his father Frank murdered his mother June.<\/p>\n<p>In his first full collection, Whistle, Figura explores the trauma, loss and grief of the past.&nbsp;&nbsp; Yet this book is in no way the poetry equivalent of a \u2018misery memoir\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>Instead, the poet draws on his training and experience as a photographer to frame and study his broken childhood.&nbsp; In poem after poem we observe the tender meticulous ways in which he remembers, mourns and forgives; the ways in which he tests and builds a future.<\/p>\n<p>Poetry is language that can act as a time machine.&nbsp; Martin Figura travels back to the 50s, to the meeting and courtship of his parents, his own birth and boyhood and the stark dislocation of his boyhood when he and his sister, lose, effectively, both parents.<\/p>\n<p>Figura employs throughout a pared-back and piercing lyricism and thus achieves, without a hint of sentimentality, the wrenching sense of abandonment his younger self experienced after the loss of his mother.&nbsp; At times I am put in mind of these lines by the late Peter Porter, who also lost his mother as a boy:<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &#8220;\u2026the motherless boy<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; circuiting his grown up garden&#8221;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; from &#39;Ode to an afternoon&#39;, Peter Porter.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>Figura regards his younger self with a sombre and insightful pity in poems that are distinguished by their quiet restrained diction.&nbsp; This compels attention, drawing the reader into the places of this fearsome narrative.&nbsp; The poems illuminate the darkness of the narrative. In the sequence &#39;Journey 1965&#39; Figura takes us with him on a journey to his father\u2019s birthplace in Silesia where<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The train stops in the middle of nowhere\u2026<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>And where in the family farmhouse<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; \u2026 on hard benches, we eat and the talk<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; goes on above my head in Polish.&nbsp; I can hear<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; and smell the cattle through a slatted wooden door.<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The dog\u2019s bowl, a German helmet, clatters<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; on the stone floor and is licked clean.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>In the chilling and vertiginous poem &#39;The News&#39; the boy\u2019s world is turned upside down when he is told of his mother\u2019s death \u2013<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The whole thing tips upside down<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; at the news.&nbsp; Cups and saucers<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; spin away \u2013 disappear<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; into the infinite Artex swirl.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I am in the middle of the room,<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; the centre of a small universe<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; equidistant, not just from the walls<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; but the floor and ceiling too.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I begin a slow shadowless rotation<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; through the silence, heads are planets:<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; the doctor\u2019s few thin hairs<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; the rings of Saturn,<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uncle Alan is the ginger sun,<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; my sister and I small lost moons,<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Auntie Margaret\u2019s cloud cover,<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uncle Philip\u2019s oil fields,<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Father Lightbound\u2019s black jacket<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; shouldering its own Milky Way.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <br \/>The story is traced through the span of years; here in &#39;Counting&#39; is a description of his father in Broadmoor, where we see him counting obsessively &#8211;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patients through a door, peas on a plate, knives, forks,<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; spoons, keys on a belt, pills in a plastic cup, minutes<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; in a day, sixty dormitory beds, heads on pillows, shouts<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; in the night, the distance from your neighbour, monsters<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; on the ceiling, therapeutic kicks, privileges, what is lost,<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; nurses\u2019 jokes, bricks in a wall, the number of steps<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; round the hard, jigsaw pieces, one small square of sky.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <br \/>We see Frank\u2019s eventual release and his subsequent unfathomable and subdued mien, his be-numbed way of life.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>Shakespeare advises us, in Macbeth, when Malcolm tells MacDuff (on the loss of hisi wife and family to the murderous king), that we must \u2018give sorrow words\u2019.<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>In Whistle sorrow is given profound and moving words.&nbsp; This collection is a record of personal survival and renewal after the very earth of life and love has been scorched and devastated. Figura, keeping his nerve, &nbsp;guides us through a limbo of shifting and shadowed memories, through places&nbsp; where the encroaching Furies rampage, out into the clarity &nbsp;of comprehension and forgiveness, where it is possible for him, and for us , to claim life\u2019s paradoxical riches.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Take my arm<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; my arm<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; my arm<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; seventy verses of wishes<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; seventy verses of ghosts<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; let us step through these mirror-ball stars<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; and dance<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; and dance<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; and dance until<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; we\u2019ve covered the dawn with footprints<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; left midnight alone in its room<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &#39;June\u2019s Birthday Waltz&#39;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/>&nbsp;<br \/><\/span><\/font><\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align: right;\"><font size=\"2\"><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono; font-weight: bold;\">&#8230;..Reviewed by Penelope Shuttle&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <\/span><br style=\"font-weight: bold;\"><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono; font-weight: bold;\">&nbsp;<\/span><br \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\"><\/span><\/font><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\"><br \/><\/span><!--EndFragment--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Whistle by Martin Figura,&nbsp; Arrowhead Press 2010 When Martin Figura was a ten year old boy, his father Frank murdered his mother June. In his first full collection, Whistle, Figura explores the trauma, loss and grief of the past.&nbsp;&nbsp; Yet this book is in no way the poetry equivalent of a \u2018misery memoir\u2019. Instead, the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=702"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10808,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702\/revisions\/10808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}