Forgiveness, memory, loss and the vicissitudes of love are among the recurring themes of A Year of Last Things, Michael Ondaatje’s exceptional new collection of poetry. More than a decade has passed since Ondaatje, who shared the 1992 Booker Prize for his novel The English Patient, published a book of poems. The return is welcome, as he demonstrates yet again that he is a master of the genre.
Most of the poems that appear here are in free verse, with a few others written wholly or in part as prose poems. Each piece displays not only Ondaatje’s gift for the lyrical phrase but also his peripatetic nature, as the collection travels across various countries, most notably Italy, England and his native Sri Lanka. The book is divided into several sections, with the first centering on forgiveness and memory. It’s difficult to single out highlights when every poem is so accomplished, but particularly moving is “5 A.M.,” a tender piece on the restorative beauty of memories and the way they return unexpectedly, “like a gift / from forgetfulness, / as a desire can wake you.”
Later sections include ruminations on unfulfilled lives, such as “The Then,” in which Ondaatje writes of being struck by the urge “to erase this life, and desire what I might have known / in photographs of you before we met.” There is also a group of erudite love poems, including the witty “Leg Glance,” in which he employs a cricket metaphor referring to “not bothering to move / from the path of the dangerous ball,” to parallel one’s behavior in the midst of a love affair.
Set in museums and piazzas across several continents, with references to painters, novelists, playwrights, jazz musicians and even W.G. Sebald’s technique of incorporating photographs into the text, A Year of Last Things brilliantly explores its themes.
