Upon Her Fluent Route

Kelly L. Green is a freelance writer living in Ajax, Ontario.

Rapoport takes the title for her new collection of poems from Emily
Dickinson: “The Moon upon her fluent Route / Defiant of a Road— /
The Star’s Etruscan Argument / Substantiate a God.” Like Dickinson,
Rapoport loves the moon, among other things. Her poetry is filled with
references to things lunar—the tides, the aureole, the new moon with
its sickle shape. In “Lunar Aspects,” she calls the moon “a beach
ball. Hecate bounced her over to Diana, who threw her back again.”
From the same poem: “it’s a pearl on a woman’s earlobe, a necklace
encircling her throat.”

While the moon is a thematic thread tying this collection together,
Rapoport does not limit herself to moon imagery. She also loves the
plants of both land and sea, geography, seasons, precious stones and
metals, and color. The first section of the collection, “Seagreen
Frontiers, Seagold,” includes eight separate poems under the heading
“Going for Gold.” The first of these, “Rumours,” combines
several of her favorite poetic devices, using place names, metals, and
jewels to create her image.

Rapoport’s poetry is riddled with “rubies and amethysts, sapphires
/ winding out of my dream,” not to mention “cobalt and carmine /
gridelin and beryl / turquoise and wine / claret and indigo” (“In
the Beginning the Dance of Love”). It is poetry of exploration,
beauty, contemplation, and dance. Some of it—especially the section
entitled “A Child to Tell Our Stories,” with its “Floridian
Monsters” and “How to Make Soup”—is even a whole lot of fun.
This is poetry for people who love poetry, and for those who don’t
read poetry as well.