Description
The Crystal Lithium by James Schuyler. In reading The Crystal Lithium we are immediately under the spell of what this indolent poet does best, lines of supple multifaceted transcription. The definition of lithium works well for Schuyler, it is a soft, silvery, highly reactive element; that definition might describe Schuyler’s hyper reactive line as well. In a letter to Kenneth Koch, Schuyler said he took the title of the poem from a postcard: “an old timey spa, somewhere in the south Kaintuck, I think.” The notion of crystal lithium or healing crystal is that it is self-clearing, self cleansing, healthy points, generative; its optical non-linearity’s suits itself for the rich synesthesia inherent in Schuyler’s imagination. David Schapiro states Schuyler has a “meticulous Williams like devotion to the physical world.” He often seems like he looks out a window and transcribes or more carefully according to Joseph Comte, reveals “being and cognition as a continuum rather than as a dichotomy.” “The Crystal Lithium,” exfoliates in long Whitmanic lines, the ordinary, the daily and in this poem more specifically the weather: snow. Schuyler lived with the painter Fairfield Porter’s family in Maine and this poem seems very much like Maine. It tracks snow on a beach but through its associations the poem also becomes very domestic, covering carpentry work, taking out the garbage, images of summer lawns, Christmas trees, a monthly almanac, and trips to the supermarket, the gas station all with a small town feel.
