The Beckoning Eye

Barbara A. Holland (1925-1988) was called "the Sybil of Greenwich Village." Her poems of Greenwich Village's Bohemia in its last decades are sharp and surreal takes from an outsider who fled a Wall Street job and chose to live among the writers and artists, a "full-time poet" when such a choice of profession was a guarantee of neglect and poverty. She is the flaneur of streets and harbors, of coffeehouses and lofts, always "alone in my voice" but eager to share her sharp and biting images and visions. From the papers and notebooks of Barbara A. Holland comes The Beckoning Eye, this collection of 150 poems that appeared in little magazines, few of which have ever appeared in book form. Holland's long-time publisher Brett Rutherford has also added 29 other poems, recovered or reconstructed from the poet's notebooks and typed manuscripts. This is the third volume of publications from the Barbara A. Holland papers, following Medusa: The Lost First Chapbook and The Secret Agent.Whether writing about doomed love affairs or her flirtation with the mysteries of Hindu religion; recreating the persona of a jealous witch, or an outraged Virgin Mary in grief at Calvary; playfully bouncing stars, moons, and mirror images in Magritte-inspired pre-dawn fantasies; or puzzling over her fellow residents of Gotham's Bohemia, Holland is at turns brilliant, unnerving, and witty. Many of her poems are miniature opera arias, tightly-knotted in syntax, poetic hand-grenades disguised as walnuts. They are meant for reading and performing aloud, and unfurl their meanings on repetition. This is the 253rd publication of The Poet's Press.