Marrying the animals

Near the centre of Marrying the Animals, Cornelia Hoogland's new book of poetry, is the sequence "In the Meantime: Elizabeth Smart Poems" Hoogland's exploration of Smart's obsession with the poet George Barker is an apt heart for this volume, for its abiding spirit is passion. With feather touch and "kelp green longing," Hoogland pauses over the minutiae of the daily, of the loved. Her lyric intensity embraces family, friends, lovers and literature. Yet she never ignores the untameable passion that circumscribes both love and language, and shades the familiar into wilderness.