Authors: Raymond Carver
All of Us (37 page)
For Tess (81)
A Haircut (82—3)
Happiness in Cornwall (84—5)
Venice (86)
The Lightning Speed of the Past (87)
Wenas Ridge (88—9)
Blood (90)
Limits (91—2)
The White Field (93—4)
The Window (95)
Its Course (96—7)
Sinew (98—9)
Eagles (100)
Elk Camp (101—2)
Earwigs (103—4)
The Fishing Pole of the Drowned Man (105)
My Boat (106—7)
Shooting (108)
Cutlery (109—10)
Work (113)
Cadillacs and Poetry (114—5)
The Hat (116—18)
The Young Fire Eaters of Mexico City (119)
Powder-Monkey (120—1)
The Pen (122—3)
The Pipe (124)
What You Need for Painting (125)
Bonnard’s Nudes (126)
A Squall (127)
Kafka’s Watch (128)
My Work (129—30)
The Garden (131—2)
My Crow (133)
Grief (134)
Bahia, Brazil (135—6)
The House behind This One (137)
Reading (138—9)
Evening (140)
Spell (141—2)
The Schooldesk (143—5)
After Rainy Days (149)
Hominy and Rain (150—1)
Radio Waves (152—3)
The Phenomenon (154)
Fear (155)
The Mail (156—7)
Egress (158—9)
The River (160)
Migration (161—2)
Sleeping (163)
An Account (164—5)
Simple (166)
Sweet Light (167)
Listening (168)
The Eve of Battle (169—70)
The Caucasus: A Romance (171—3)
The Rest (174)
Locking Yourself Out, Then Trying to Get Back In (177—8)
The Old Days (179—80)
Mesopotamia (181—2)
The Possible (183—4)
Waiting (185)
In Switzerland (186—8)
Ask Him (189—91)
Yesterday, Snow (192—3)
Where Water Comes Together with Other Water (194—5)
The Fields (196—7)
Slippers (198)
Circulation (199—200)
Scale (201—2)
Asia (203—4)
The Gift (205—6)
The notes to
Where Water Comes Together with Other Water
and
Ultramarine
indicate which poems from those two books were included in
In a Marine Light.
The following poems were not included in
In a Marine Light
:
Movement
The Road
The Ashtray
Medicine
Rain
Aspens
At Least
The Grant
The Poem I Didn’t Write
In the Year 2020
The Juggler at
Heaven’s Gate
My Daughter and Apple Pie
Commerce
Next Door
The Party
Interview
The Windows of the Summer Vacation Houses
Away
Music
Plus
Extirpation
The Catch
My Death
Afghanistan
Reading Something in the Restaurant
A Poem Not against Songbirds
Late Afternoon, April 8, 1984
An Afternoon
The Cobweb
Memory [2]
Stupid
The Jungle
The Sensitive Girl
The Minuet
A Tall Order
Where the Groceries Went
Vigil
In the Lobby of the Hotel del Mayo
Wind
The Best Time of the Day
Company
Yesterday
The Prize
Loafing
The Debate
September
Heels
The Phone Booth
The Scratch
The Child
After Reading
Two Towns in Provence
Bibliographical and Textual Notes
Abbreviations
| 1st | First magazine appearance or separate publication |
| ANP | A New Path to the Waterfall (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1989) |
| ANTSM | At Night the Salmon Move (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Capra Press, 1976) |
| AUP | Advance uncorrected proof (publisher’s paperbound uncorrected page proofs sent to review sources in advance of finished book) |
| F | Fires (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Capra Press, 1983) |
| EFTD | Early for the Dance (Concord, NH: William B. Ewert, 1986) |
| IAML | In a Marine Light: Selected Poems (London: Collins Harvill, 1987) |
| NHP | No Heroics, Please: Uncollected Writings (London: Harvill, 1991) |
| NK | Near Klamath (Sacramento, Calif.: English Club of Sacramento State College, 1968). Note: Because NK is unpaginated, page references to it are given in brackets. |
| RC | Raymond Carver |
| TD | Those Days: Early Writings by Raymond Carver , ed. William L. Stull (Elmwood, Conn.: Raven Editions, 1987) |
| TW | This Water (Concord, NH: William B. Ewert, 1985) |
| U | Ultramarine (New York: Random House, 1986) |
| WI | Winter Insomnia (Santa Cruz, Calif.: Kayak Books, 1970) |
| WWCT | Where Water Comes Together with Other Water (New York: Random House, 1985) |
Fires: Essays, Poems, Stories
First edition: Santa Barbara, Calif.: Capra Press, 1983. A Noel Young Book. Simultaneously published in hardcover and paperback. Publication date: 14 Apr. 1983.
First signed, limited edition: “Printed April 1983 for Capra Press by the Kingsport Press. Two hundred & fifty copies have been numbered and signed by the author and bound into boards” (limitation leaf).
First expanded edition: New York, NY: Vintage Books, 1984. Adds “The
Paris Review
Interview”. Publication date: 30 May 1984.
First English edition: London: Collins Harvill, 1985. Omits “The
Paris Review
Interview” and the “Afterword”; adds “My Father’s Life” and “John Gardner: The Writer as Teacher”. Publication date: 15 Apr. 1985.
Dedication: For Tess
Epigraph: From “Cows Grazing at Sunrise” by William Matthews,
Flood
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1982) 4.
Copy-text: First edition, first printing, collated and corrected against later editions and printings overseen by RC.
Small-press sources and separate publications:
NK, WI, ANTSM, Distress Sale
(Lord John, 1981),
Two Poems
(Scarab, 1982),
At Night the Salmon Move
(Capra, 1983),
Looking for Work/Downstream
(n.p., 1988).
1
DRINKING WHILE DRIVING
: in
NK
[26],
WI
55.
| 1—2 | It is August. |
| | I have not read a book in six months NK, WI |
| 8 | go, / go NK, WI |
| 15 | will / is going to NK, WI |
2
LUCK
:
1st
in
Kayak
[Santa Cruz, Calif.] 50 (May 1979): 40; in
The Poet’s Choice
, a special issue of
Tendril
[Green Harbor, Mass.] 9 (1980): 43—4.
| 4 | drank, too, but they |
| | could handle it. 1st, Tendril |
| 21 | to take / and took 1st |
| 28—9 | at the starry sky — |
| | it was always starry then 1st, Tendril |
| 38 | morning. / morning, 1st, Tendril |
| 39—40 | I saw a woman sleeping on our lawn. Tendril |
| 42 | then / and then 1st |
| 54 | no one / nobody 1st, Tendril |
| 55 | luck, I / luck I Tendril |
| 59—61 | for a house where nobody |
| | was home, and all I could drink. 1st, Tendril |
3
DISTRESS SALE
:
1st
in
Kayak
[Santa Cruz, Calif.] 49 (Oct. 1978): 16—17; separately published as a broadside (Northridge, Calif.: Lord John Press, 1981).
| 2—7 | the child’s canopy bed and vanity |
| | table, the sofa, end tables and lamps, |
| | the boxes of assorted books and records. |
| | We carried out kitchen items, |
| | a clock radio, hanging clothes, a big easy |
| | chair that had been with them from the beginning 1st |
| 10 | and they set themselves up around that |
| | to do business. 1st |
| 12 | I’m staying there with them trying to dry out 1st |
| 15 | It’s / It is 1st |
| 24—5 | of clothing before moving on. |
| | Everyone who wanders into this scene is embarrassed. |
| | The man, my friend, sits at the table 1st |
| 32 | This reduces us all. Is this what we’ve come to? 1st |
| 38 | I reach for my wallet before I understand 1st |
| | I reach for my wallet and that is how I understand: |
| | Lord John |
4
YOUR DOG DIES
:
1st
in
CutBank
[Univ. of Montana, Missoula] 1 (1973): 32; in
ANTSM
25.
| 14 | it / the dog afterwards 1st, ANTSM |
| 16 | it / it, 1st |
| 25 | hear / suddenly hear 1st |
5
PHOTOGRAPH OF MY FATHER IN HIS TWENTY-SECOND YEAR
:
1st in Colorado Quarterly
[Univ. of Colorado, Boulder] 17.2 (Autumn 1968): 162; in
NK
[13],
WI
17. All lines begin with capital letters in
1st, NK
, and
WI
.
| 6 | denim / levi 1st |
| 7 | 1934 Ford / Ford circa 1934 1st, NK, WI |
| 9 | wear his old hat cocked over his ear, stick out his tongue… 1st, NK, WI |
| 13 | And the beer. Father I loved you, 1st |
| | And the bottle of beer. Father, I loved you, NK, WI |
| 14 | Yet how can I say thank you, I who cannot hold my liquor either 1st, NK, WI |
| 15 | don’t / do not 1 st, NK, WI |
6
HAMID RAMOUZ
(1818—1906):
1st
in
Mississippi Review
[Univ. of Southern Mississippi] 21 [7.3] (Fall 1978): 118.
| 1 | began / started 1st |
| 3 | gunshot / gutshot 1st |
7
BANKRUPTCY
: in
NK
[7],
WI
24. All lines begin with capital letters in
NK
.
8
THE BAKER
:
1st
in
Kayak
[Santa Cruz, Calif.] 50 (May 1979): 41; separately published with
“Louise”
in
Two Poems
(Salisbury, Md.: Scarab Press, 1982).
| 5—6 | Pancho introduced his new girl friend |
| | and her husband who was made to wear |
| | his white apron, 1st |
| 8 | him / him everything 1st |
| 17—18 | The husband crossed himself, |
| | took off his boots and |
| | silently left the house 1st |
| 22—3 | humiliated, trying to save his life, |
| | he is the hero of this poem. 1st |
9
IOWA SUMMER
:
1st
in
Chelsea
[New York, NY] 22—3 (June 1968): 57—8; in
NK
[2],
WI
27. All lines begin with capital letters in
1st, NK
, and
WI
.
| Title: “Iowa Summer 1967” NK, WI | |
| 7—12 | It is only later, after they have gone, |
| | I realize they have delivered a letter from my wife. |
| | “What are you doing there?” my wife asks. “Are you drinking?” |
| | I study the postmark for hours until it, too, begins to fade. |
| | Someday, I hope to forget all this. 1st, NK, WI |
10
ALCOHOL
:
1st
in
New England Review
[Hanover, NH] 4.4 (Summer 1982): 530.
| 33—4 | [stanza break between these lines in 1st ] |
| 35—6 | You hear the song. 1st |
11
FOR SEMRA, WITH MARTIAL VIGOR
:
1st
in
Beloit Poetry Journal
[Ellsworth, Maine] 16.2 (Winter 1965—6): 17—19; in
NK
[20—3],
WI
40—1.
