Bending the Branch

Neil Querengesser taught in the Department of English, University of Calgary, Alberta.

In this, his third book of poetry, Cooper takes the reader on a romantic walk through his native New Brunswick woods. Most of the 26 poems in Bending the Branch focus upon the small, normally unnoticed, details of the woods and upon the small, forgotten human relies. Typical titles of poems include “The Empty Shell,” “The Bees,” “The Axe,” and “The Shack.” Through quiet meditation upon these objects, Cooper seeks a transcendental experience, but his experience of the “something in me that wants to join the energy inside plants and trees” is not always successfully communicated to the reader.

This lack of communication may be owing to the fact that most of the poems reflect a similarity in treatment of subject matter and in poetic technique. In many of the poems, each section looks like a sentence that has been conveniently divided into lines according to the appearance of prepositional phrases:

Yet there are several worthwhile exceptions to this practice. In some poems, image and rhythm play upon each other in perfect harmony. An example of this harmony can be seen in one of “Three Tiny Poems”:

Inside the leaf

there are rooms of light

where the chlorophyll swarms and sings.

Perhaps this book is better dipped into occasionally than read in its entirety. Certainly some of the poems lend themselves well to quiet outdoor reading. Indeed, the book’s physical dimensions allow it to be slipped into the pocket of any backpacker’s blue jeans.