ROTC Kills: Poems

I’ve always thought of poetry as a kind of inner soliloquy, reflecting the capacity for self-consciousness that makes us human, says John Koethe.

In this new book, Koethe’s poems move easily between autobiographical anecdote and philosophical reflection.

ROTC Kills, the provocatively titled poem that gives its name to the collection, is a wistful reflection upon the ‘60s as viewed from forty years later. The Red Shoes uses the 1948 film of Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale to evoke memories of the poet’s childhood and of his conflicted love for his mother. In The Great Gatsby, Koethe brings together Fitzgerald’s novel, the story of Henry Hudson’s search for the Northwest Passage, and his own coming to New York as a young man compelled by dreams and the promise of something still undefined. The Poem of the Mind, one of the most important in the collection, is a philosophical piece that recalls some of the themes which arise in the more descriptive shorter poems, an example of how the poems here echo one another and form a thought-provoking whole.

A rich and resonant collection, ROTC Kills is a meditation of the poet’s experience of time and consciousness, words that flow with a moving poignancy, a sense of humor, and a watchful waiting that gives its title to the final poem.