Christal
Cooper 2,928 Words
Around ECHO in 80 Days:
The Many Echoes of ECHO
by Christina Lovin
Echo is the mountain nymph of Greek Mythology
who loved her own voice, and like any little girl, loved to come to earth to
play with beautiful nymphs, while denying the love of any man or god, even to
the point of refusing the lecherous god Pan.
Out of anger, Pan incited a group of shepherds to kill her, tear her
into tiny pieces, and spread the pieces all over the world. The goddess of the earth, Gala, received those
pieces of Echo, her voice repeating the last words of others.
Echo is also the name of the
communicative satellite experiments conducted by the American government in
which two metalized balloon-shaped satellites, Echo 1 (launched in 1961) and
Echo 2 (launched in 1964) were used as passive reflectors of microwave
communicative signals bouncing from one point of the earth to the other.
The Greek Goddess Echo, Echo 1, and
Echo 2 are singing, chanting, crying, speaking signals in the form of poems
that bounce from apogee to perigee of the earth to the other in Christina
Lovin’s most recent poetry collection Echo, published by Bottom Dog Press
(www.smithdocs.net).
Echo is a book of autobiographical poems, historical
poems touching on the history of the baby boom generation, an attempt to hold
on to the good memories of the past, and an attempt to exorcise the bad
memories of the past. Echo is
also an elegy for: womanhood; the
precious haunts of childhood; land of the Midwest, and loved ones that have
passed on.
There are poems depicting the Illinois
countryside with human traits. In “Echo
1” Lovin refers to corn and its narrow spaces “like confessionals can hide a
girl/ who wants to share the cool green secrets/ and learn the names/ of all
things dark and wild”.
In “Shells” she depicts Pine trees as gossipers:
“Pines gossiped coldly, tall on all
sides,/ crowding the rutted roads where they crossed, littered/ with ruined
shells from the button factory, shells that filled/ low places in the
road: opalescent pink, creamy and
smooth/ as flesh.”
In “Elms”
trees are “elegant/ but outdated, their feathered
hats a quiver/ with gossip and gospel, their sturdy arms/ full of pies, fried
chicken, and green gelatin/ thick with canned pear halves, walnuts,/ and
Jesus.” The elm trees also embody
gods of white supremacy forcing even the statues in Lincoln Park to bow before:
Out
there where the black-faced
statues of deferential
jockeys lined white-rock
lanes around the
park. Expectantly, they bowed
beneath the elms every
fifty feet, hands held out
as if to hold the reins
of some rich man’s horse,
or gather a penny tip,
then diffidently dip
their head to murmur,
‘Yassir”
Excerpt from Echo “Elms”,
page 25
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin
Soon the elms are no longer strong, rich
white men who own horses; they are now decrepit old, diseased men.
The
first diseased tree discovered
on a boulevard near the
center of town, where old elms
gathered around the even
older college, an aging family
of still virile
gentlemen whose wizened faces
seem to peer into the
future and see what lay.
Excerpt from Echo “Elms”, page 27
Copyright granted by Christina Lovin
Soon the trees the disease polio, that does not
discriminate between black and white.
The diseased trees are in a way free from discrimination – they no
longer can differentiate between colors.
All, both black and white, who touch them receive the polio. The trees are now matchmakers – they become
polio bringing two races of people together – in hopes of finding a cure in the
form of polio vaccination that does not discriminate.
We swallowed the bitter-
sweet remedy, despised
the taint of medicine,
while outside in the
Lombard yard, the giant elm
(second largest in the country) – breathed
in our useless breaths,
returning the life-
giving oxygen – stood
tall, still vibrant
at ninety. Soon, Old Ben would fall
to the epidemic, the
DDT-cure ineffective
and dangerous. Unmindful, we walked out
into a town of ten
thousand elm trees
spreading their strong
summer canopies of green
over the streets, their
shadows dappling
the oblivious brick,
that , too would soon be gone,
obliterated beneath a
smothering caul of asphalt.
Excerpt from Echo, “Elms”, Page 28
Copyright granted by Christina Lovin.
There are poems that are of religious Christina
themes, which seem fitting since Lovin was reared in a Christian family and at
one time a preacher’s wife.
In “Gathering Eggs” a little girl imagines the
henhouse to be a cathedral, the hens the priests and congregation, and herself
offering the only sacrifices she can give, only to have that sacrifice consumed
by the black snake, causing the girl to go through a stigmata, or to endure the
same wounds that Christ endured.
The henhouse like any
cathedral
nave – cool and hushed-
the old biddies
muttering
at their stations. The cross
beams above lifting the
vesper
chorus of pullets to the
roof-
safe from the black snake
that lives beneath
the stone foundation.
I kneel before the
congregation
of setters, one to a
box,
collect the reluctant
offerings
from beneath each warm
body, accept the blood
blisters kissed onto
tender skin
as the price of
obedience.
A single egg – the
sacrifice
of a small pale world
broken against the rough
floor
of the henhouse – golden
stigmata that stains,
then dries,
returning dust to dust.
A novice and her litany
of loss: too many eggs,
one old basket.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Gathering Eggs” Page 16
Copyright
granted by Christina Lovin.
One can interpret “Brushing My Mother’s Teeth”
full of religious imagery even if perhaps Lovin did not intend for the poem to
be interpreted as such. The poem starts
out with a daughter visiting her mother at a nursing home, washing her mother’s
teeth:
Solid,
these are held in my hand: soiled-
yellow
and caked with starch from nursing
home
food. The brush sends out specks that
stick
to
the faucet, spot the break-proof mirror
to
the tiny shared toilet. Another woman
mumbles
incoherently on the other side
of
the cheap laminate door while water runs
clean
now around the precise shape
of
my mother’s shrunken gums, sloughing
the
smooth channel, rinsing clean each tooth,
perfect
save for the chip hewn from the left front
incisor;
Excerpt from Echo, “Brushing My
Mother’s Teeth” Page 36
Copyright granted by Christina Lovin
This reviewer envisions the daughter
(who is the speaker of the poem) symbolizing Jesus and the mother’s teeth
symbolizing the disciple’s feet. The
daughter remembers the washing of her mother’s feet, which she describes as a
spiritual experience, where her mother is Jesus amongst women disciples, and
like Jesus washed His own disciples feet, her mother washing her female
disciples’ feet.
And I remember her foot-
wet,
dripping warm, scented
water
back into an enamel basin,
then gently rubbed, lovingly
patted
dry
to be followed by the other.
the
foot washing rising, untying
the
long linen towel; kept just for this
sacred observance. I see my mother accept the cloth
winding it around her waist,
then kneel
before the next woman in the
circle.
Take her foot, lifts it by a
callused heel
into the washbowl between
them.
I watch bored, too young to
participate,
not understanding then those
offices of humility
one will stoop to out of duty
or tradition,
and on occasion, some reverent
love.
Excerpt from Echo, “Brushing My
Mother’s Teeth” page 36
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin
This is a powerhouse of a poem that introduces
not only the power of voice in the form of teeth, but also the power of women
in religion – man is not the only one’s who can symbolize Jesus.
In “Sunday” a young girl imagines her
father’s bloody apron with a dead hen in his hand as the blood of Jesus.
Other poems that depict religious Christian
imagery are “Someone Else’s Sin”, “Mary’s Child”, “The Mourning After”,
“Assumption of the Virgin”, and “What
The Other Woman knows: Haiku to Be Read
Alone (thought could be interpreted as a sensual poem).
There are poems about racism and other
prejudices that occurred in the baby boomer’s generation: “Flesh”, “A Cup Of White Sugar”, “Elms”, “To
The Ghosts Of Halloween”, “French
Seams”, and “Damn You, Barbie #1”.
In the pop-culture poem “Paper Doll Ghazal” Lovin
writes of Elizabeth Taylor and “those violet eyes”; Kim Novak and her “blonde
mystique about her quiet face”; Debbie Reynolds who “smiled the widest of them
all”; and Betty Davis “must have been a hand-me-down”.
In “Princesses” the speaker of the poem
compares her tiara with that of Grace Kelly, Cinderella, Lee Meriwether. In the last stanza she is thrilled to be
wearing her own crown, walking down her on Miss America aisle, only to realize
the frog she married, was not a prince, but still just a frog.
Only to find
myself
hesitation-stepping down some narrow June
aisle, too young, too
stupid in my own coronet
of pearls. Eager to kiss the frog at the alter,
that
would never transform into a prince.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Princess”, page 48
Copyright
granted by Christina
Other famous names mentioned are Emmy
Lou Harris; Dick Biondi, Wolfman Jack, Simon and Garfunkel, and numerous 1960s
singing groups.
Perhaps the most entertaining (but
still compelling) poems are the crown sonnets “Myth Information” and “Trinity”
focusing on: Marilyn Monroe, Jayne
Mansfield, Joseph McCarthy, Jackie Kennedy, Mae West, Dr. Spock, Elvis Presley,
Hugh Hefner, Patsy Cline, Betty Friedan, John F Kennedy, Robert F Kennedy,
Martin Luther King.
There are also poems about the mistreatment of
single mothers, the danger of nuclear weapons, and the power of a woman
speaking her own mind.
Lovin christened the second crown
sonnet (fifteen sonnets) after the code name Trinity, named by J Robert
Oppenheimer, to describe the nuclear bomb-testing project conducted in July of
1945 in New Mexico.
The unseen enemy knitted
its own dark chain
of silent destruction
across New Mexico
and Nevada, as bombs
burst over the plains,
spewing widespread
radiation.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Trinity II” Page 81
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin
In the section “Scandal” Lovin writes
of the violent crimes that gripped the world giving voices to both perpetrator
and victim, but benefiting the victim and never diminishing the horror: “The Ninth Muse: Anaphora For Corazon” refers to mass murderer
Richard Speck and the ninth nurse, Corazon Amurao, the only survivor, because
Richard Speck was only expecting eight nurses.
The poem consists of eleven four-line
stanzas, the first line of the first ten stanzas begin with “there should have been eight that night”,
and finally ends in a bittersweet ending: a triumph of justice delivered by the
Melpomene, the Muse of Singing and Tragedy, and Corazon Amurao; and a tragedy
that such horror could even take place.
So the slayer of the
fates, silencer
of
the muses, confused in the carnage, lost
count,
missing the witness, the ninth, the muse
Melpomene, who lived to point a finger
and
exclaim: “This is the man!” Silenced,
eight others; now the ninth
muse sings no more:
holding
only her tragic mask, the dripping blade.
Excerpt from Echo, “The Ninth
Muse: Anaphora For Corazon”, Page 91
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin
“Panes’ gives needed life and cry for justice
to victim Catherine Genovese who was stabbed top death while 38 people watched
and did not help her or call the police.
It is the witnesses who are condemned in this poem that reveals that
animals are not only “that prickle/ that skims the skin like a loosed
curl” but also a
graying woman awoke
behind the shades
of her dream about kids’
slaughter and nanny goat screams
on a farm long since
plowed under by progress,
turned on the bedside
lamp to listen,
then lay back staring at
shadows
that spread like
bloodstains.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Panes” Page 92
Copyright by
Christina Lovin.
There are also poems of convicted murdered Dr.
Antonio Santamaria in “Private Dirt”; murderer Gary Wixforth and his victim
Phyllis Olinger in “Blood Brothers”; and murderers Martha Beck and Raymond
Fernandez and their victim Janet Fay in “Burning Love”. “Elegy For Sally And Rose” focuses on
convicted spies Axis Sally (Mildred Gillars) and Tokyo Rose (Iva Toguri).
The poet makes it known that her first echo was
while she was in her mother’s womb in “Cry Babies”
It was true. I was a crybaby. But I chose my sobs.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Cry Babies”, Page 18
Copyright by Christina
Lovin.
In, “Cry Babies” there is speaker of the poem’s
cry of sexual abuse by her grandfather:
The familiar pain would
stricture
my chest like the remembrance of some strange,
work-rough hand
squeezing my budding breast as we walked toward
tall rows of July corn.
ripe tassels dusting the
top of my head, the sharp knowledge
of those rasping leaves cutting into bare skin
and leaving scratches
as fingernails might, the scars deeper. I never learned to swallow my tears
like some girls do; hot-eyed but stoic the granddaughters of Him
of the cornfield whispered of a sin that rustled
like cornstalks in the dark
as the three of us crowded a farmhouse bedroom
one sultry summer night.
I began to understand that there are things to
make a young girl cry
Excerpt
from Echo,
“Cry Babies”, Page 18
Copyright
by Christina Lovin
She continues to echo with fearful caution, but
there seems to be one person who is willing to listen to the little girl’s
echoes that is the girl’s Daddy who at times seems fearful
-her father’s hot names
for fury and rage. Listen – you will be the girl
to witness and fill in
the blank spaces
and you will tell all –
you will talk
to the hollow halls of
night
between the rows of corn
in its secret
Excerpt from Echo,
“Echo 1 August 1960”, Page 11
Copyright granted by Christina Lovin.
You never spoke – nights
appointed, shame, silence secret-
While together you watched Echo arc across, dark space, named
For that little girl who
said too much -who learned it’s better
not to talk.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Echo 1 August 1960”, Page 12
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin
The narrator in “Laundry” finds her
mother’s voice in her mother’s handwriting in a cloth covered notebook; thus
the muscles of the fingers and hand also serve as the function of the mouth –
the fingers the teeth, the hands the mouth producing
heartfelt prayers for
her children:
blessings and
absolutions
spelled out beside each
name
in that familiar squared
hand.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Laundry”, Page 35.
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin.
The narrator reflects on her mother teaching her
how to write:
She taught me to write:
ABC’s
pressed with lead into
cheap paper.
I copied each stroke,
every camber
and closed arc, over and
over again,
her clear script
becoming min-
my name a span of
homemade letters
that fluttered and waved
across the page,
pinned to the lines like
rumpled laundry
Excerpt from Echo,
“Laundry”, Page 35
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin
She acknowledges the power her mother taught her
in voice to write her name and know her name not only by her fingers and hand, but
also by her mind, and her mouth
symbols of who I might
become, who I was
back then. I looked down from the attic
window to my unwritten life,
a blank
expanse of sheets,
Excerpt from Echo,
“Laundry”, Page 35
Copyright granted by
Christina Lovin
In one poem, there is the echo of the
mollusk that was known to bore, or eat stones and/or corral rocks. Another term for these mollusks is Lithophagus,
the title of Lovin’s poem, in which it the speaker’s mother eats stones while
pregnant with the speaker’s baby brother.
The baby brother, after he is born, consumes with savor dirt, grit, and
pebbles.
The speaker of the poem describes this type of
eating and diet as a family trait., where she is left to eat the most
difficult:
It must be a legacy: this family trait, this brittle
yearning for the crunch and
crack and crumbling tooth-
to bite down on a secret till
it splinters
in the mouth and lodges in the
throat like proof.
Lithophagus, at heart, I
shrugged at that taboo
and swallowed stonier things,
like loneliness and you.
Excerpt from Echo,
“Lithophagus”, Page 67
Copyright by
Christina Lovin
The big question of this book of poetry is what
is Echo? Is Echo the voice or the identity of that
voice? Is Echo who we are in the
past, the present, or the future?
Perhaps there is no right or wrong answer – but the interpretation of
the reader. To Christina Lovin, she
reveals the answer to that question in her powerhouse poem “Social Studies.”
Echo is a poetry collection that is
Lovin’s world – circular and never ending, encompassing any reader who is
willing to enter. Each individual poem
is its own satellite, sending rays from one side of the earth to the other,
encompassing past, present, and future; the three elements that are the make-up
of what it means not to be human and not to be spirit, but to be spiritually
humane.
Echo also encompasses the undesirable residue of memories
being torn apart from the desirable memories of life – only to learn that a language is depleted
unless a message is not taken as its whole.
It is through the mouth that these
confessionals, messages, voices, and echoes can be heard and break through the
barriers that only Christina Lovin’s poetry can.
Photo
Description and Copyright Information
Photo
1A
Echo
from the Greek Mythology
Oil
on Canvas Painting attributed to Alexandre Cabanel
1874
Public
Domain
Photo
2B
Photo
Pan from Greek Mythology
Oil
on canvas attributed to Mikhail Vrubel
1988
Public
Domain
Photo
3C
Echo
1 sits fully inflated at a navy hanger in Weeksville, North Carolina
Attributed
to NASA
Public
Domain
Photo
4D
Echo
2 under going tensile stress test in dirigible hanger at Weeksville, North
Carolina
Attributed
to NASA
Public
Domain
Photo
5E
Jacket
cover of Echo
Photo
6F
Bottom
Dog Press logo
Photo
7G
Narrow
path between two rows of corn in Tippecanoe County, Indiana
August
30, 2008
Attributed
to Huwwilloms
Public
Domain
Photo
8H
White
Pines Forest Park near Byron, Illinois.
October
6, 2007
Photo
attributed to Ivo Shandor
GNU
Free Documentation License Version 1.2
CCASA
3.0 Unported License
Photo
9I
Elm
trees in Lincoln, Illinois
Postcard
image from the late 19th to early 20th centuries
Provided
by Mike Hamilton born in 1940
Public
Domain
Photo
10J
Lincoln
Park , Chicago, Illinois
January
24, 2004
Attributed
to Jeremy Atherton
CCBYSA
2.5
Photo
11K
The
removal of dead elm trees in Lincoln, Illinois
From
1947 to 1949
Attributed
to Joshua Fikuart
Fair
Use Under the United States Copyright Law
Photo
12L
Electron
micrograph of the poliovirus
1975
Attributed
to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Public Health Image Library
Public
Domain
Photo
13M
The
famous Lombard Elm Tree that died at 97 year old due to Dutch Elm Disease
The
tree was cut down in August 1, 1966
Public
Domain
Photo
14N
Poster
featuring the Centers for Disease Control’s national symbol of Public Heath,
Wellbee.
Attributed
to Mary Hilpertshauser, Employee of the Centers fro Disease Control
Public
Domain
Photo
15O
Print
produced form a vintage postcard or vintage print.
Public
Domain
Photo
16P
Photo
17Q
Denture
Public
Domain
Photo
18R
Drawing
of Jesus washing the Disciples’ feet.
Public
Domain
Photo
19S
Photo
20T
Photo
21U
Elizabeth
Taylor in a studio publicity portrait
1955
Public
Domain
Photo
22V
Kim
Novak in 1962.
Photo attributed to Frank Bez
Photo attributed to Frank Bez
Public
Domain
Photo
23W
Debbie
Reynolds and Eddie Fisher on their wedding day in 1955.
Public
Domain
Photo
24X
Bette
Davis publicity shot for “Payment on Demand”
1951
Public
Domain
Photo
25Y
Grace
Kelly during the filming of “To Catch A Thief”
1955
Public
Domain
Photo
26Z
Painting
of “Cinderella Lost her slipper”
Attributed
to Anne Anderson
Public
Domain
Photo
27ZA
Dick
Biondi
1967
Public
Domain
Photo
28ZB
Wolfman
Jack
1979
Public
Domain
Photo
29ZC
Cover
art of a 1970 recording of Cecilia by Simon and Garfunkel
1970
Fair
Use Under the United States Copyright Law
Photo
30ZD
Marilyn
Monroe in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes”
1953
Public
Domain
Photo
31ZE
Jayne
Mansfield in “Playgirl After Dark”
1960
Public
Domain
Photo
32ZF
Joseph
McCarthy
1954
Library
of Congress
Public
Domain
Photo
33ZG
Jackie
Kennedy in New Delhi
1954
Library
of Congress
Public
Domain
Photo
34ZH
Mae
West on September 13, 1953
Attributed
to the Los Angeles Times Archive
Public
Domain
Photo
35ZI
Dr
Spock at the Miami Book Fair International
November
11, 1989
CCASA3.0
Unported License
Photo
36ZJ
Elvis
Presley publicity shot for “Jail House
Rock”
Library
of Congress
Public
Domain
Photo
37ZK
Hugh
Hefner
November
10, 2010
CCASA3.0
Unported.
Photo
38ZL
Pasty
Cline promotional photograph
March
1957
Public
Domain
Photo
39ZM
Betty
Freidan
1960
Attributed
to Fred Palumbo
Employer
of My World & Telegraph Sun Collection
Public
Domain
Photo
40ZN
President
John Fitzgerald Kennedy
February
20, 1961
Public
Domain
Photo
41ZO
Senator
Robert Francis Kennedy
May
1968
RFK
speaks form the platform of a railway business care during his whistle-stop
tour through Oregon’s Willamette Valley
GNUFDL
CCASA3.0
Unported License.
Photo
42ZP
Martin
Luther King Jr speaking against the Vietnam War at the University of Minnesota
April
27, 1967
CCASA2.0
Photo
43ZQ
J
Robert Oppenheimer
1944
Attributed
to the United States Department of Energy
Public
Domain
Photo
44ZR
Richard
Speck
Attributed
to Chicago Police
Public
Domain
Photo
45ZS
The
eight nurses murdered by Richard Speck.
Each individual photo is identified by her name.
Public
Domain
Photo
46ZT
Statue
of Melpomene
by
sculptor Wolfgang Sauber
CCASA
3.0 Unported, 2.5 Generic, 2.0 Generic, 1.0 Generic
GNU
Free Documentation License
Photo
47ZU
The
surviving nurse, Corazon Amurao
Public
Domain
Photo
48ZV
Catherine
Genovese
Fair
Use Under the United States Copyright Law
Photo
49ZW
Raymond
Fernandez
Mug
shot
Fair
Use Under The United States Copyright Law
Photo
50ZX
Martha
Beck
Mug
shot
Fair
Use Under the United States Copyright Law
Photo
51ZY
Victim
Janet Fey
Public
Domain
Photo
52ZZ
Mildred
Gillars mug shot
Public
Domain
Photo
53ZZA
Iva
Toguira mug shot
March
7, 1946
Attributed
to David Shapinsky
CCASA2.0
Generic
Photo
54ZZB
Three-month
fetus attached to the umbilical cord
Attributed
to National Museum of Health and Science
Public
Domain
Photo
55ZZC
Robert
Ericson, (Christina Lovin’s father)
Copyright
granted by Christina Lovin
Photo
56ZZD
Christina
Lovin with her mother Clara
Summer
of 1955
Copyright
granted by Christina Lovin
Photo
57ZZE
Lithophaga
trancata from Browns Bay, Auckland, New Zealand
Attributed
to Graham Bould
Public
Domain
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