I read that he lived in Washington DC for a time, in those lost years, and I wondered if I happened to pass him, unknowingly, when I was off on some stupid excursion, one of my heroes, a stranger in the street, that I didn't recognize him because I never would have thought to be looking for him. In December 2019, the artist Friedrich Kunath put on a performance at Drag City’s Chicago venue Soccer Club Club that featured Berman’s music. Pitchfork may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers.

Or just great lines like ' all water is classic water, or ' The nurses are so beautiful, he thought / Try to remember they are covered in germs. These poems fascinate me; they superficially resemble a whole host of Dylanesque "throw together a bunch of unrelated images and see what sticks" poetry that does nothing at all for me, but somehow there's something different here. I saw Silver Jews play back in 2005, a lifetime ago, and I feel fortunate to have seen Berman perform his music at least once, music which has been some of my very favorite since I was a teenager, music and lyrics that really meant the world to me, and created a very specific world for me and many people I know. Avoided this for a long time because I assumed these were gussied up variations of David Berman's lyrics for The Silver Jews.And while these can be funny and entertaining individually, whole poems composed of them quickly become old: "The evening train is a literary device. Hopeful and nostalgic; recognizable and surprising (and surprising in its recognition), this book is an important puzzle piece in the body of work that is David Bermans life, but also stands on its own.

And like any great body of work, if you break it down to the miniscule, line by line, word by word, at a molecular level, it shines just as brightly, radiates just as much, on a macro or micro scale. Other effective elements of "Snow"-- its clear sense of unity and direction-- seem lacking in many of the other poems, often leaving me floundering and annoyed.Yet the two are eternally wedded together in the way they both scratch those terrible existential itches of life, and the way both maintain a youthful fondness for existence that hasn’t lessened with age. Others I loved in this collection are Now II, Of Things Found Where They Are Not Supposed To Be, Community College in the Rain, The Charm of 5:30, Cantos for James Michener: Part Ii, and Classic Water.