The prodigal Book

I understand why this is called The Prodigal and the poetry is laced with a Christian lexicon which gives credence to the title, but midway through I could not help thinking Landscape would have been a better title (I can't help naming/renaming things forgive me) as this gorgeous journey of remembering seems less about folly and atonement as it is about capturing the beauty and emotional sweep of the various landscapes it memorializes. It is not only the experience of landscape as a noun but landscape as a verb-Walcott's lyrical reconstruction of the lands he leads us through. It is lush delicious language. The author and I have overlapping experiences of New York, Italy and the Caribbean so his journey is one I can appreciate personally as well as aesthetically. His verse has a sharp and unsentimental eye that is: tender, sensuous, and softly lit in places with humour. It filled me with wanderlust (an always danger). This is medicinal work, when the ugliness of the world and your own mind get you down, the beauty of his world will sustain you.

the peaches of summer are bouncing
on the grids of the Milanese sidewalks
in halters cut close to the coccyx.
I look and no longer sigh for the impossible