An Infusion of Violets

Using the same musical sense of language she applies to her translations, Nancy Naomi Carlson masterfully interprets herself in *An Infusion of Violets*. The sometimes erotic, sometimes melancholy landscapes she creates as the self-appointed sitar's "ragged throat, pitched / between here and when, / caught in quartertones," take our breath away. Carlson describes an interior world where tears can produce "so much salt a body floats away," where "music tuned to loss descends with rain," and where hope is placed in the "kill-cure." Here we encounter Carlson's ex-husbands and luminaries such as Rachmaninoff and Monet, among others. Filled with striking images and sensuous language, *An Infusion of Violets* is an evocative mix of formal and free-verse poems.