Book of the Peony

<p>“Gaspar Orozco’s extraordinary <em>Book of the Peony</em> blew me away by a storm of quiet flame and blackness and nothing everythingness. I am writing this from Pont-Aven where I have come to write about colonies and gatherings of artists  before regaining (what an <em>inapproprié</em>  word) and suddenly this poetry hits me in the Breton chill with—I can’t say what—a dark blaze when I expected I have no idea what?</p><p>    I had been thinking ah peony like <em>pensée</em> like a beloved and delicate pansy of thought but this peony is nearer the chrysanthemum of Japanese writing from long ago. This remarkable poetry brings the long ago into nowness if I can put it like that. It lights from far and also near burning.”   —Mary Ann Caws</p>