The Crisp Day Closing on My Hand: The Poetry of M. Travis Lane is a collection of thirty-five of her best poems, selected with an introduction by Jeanette Lynes. An environmentalist, feminist, and peace activist, M. Travis Lane is known for witty and meticulously crafted poems that explore the elusive nature of âhomeâ in both historical and present contexts and reflect on the identity of the woman poet and what it means to be a writer. Laneâs poems exhibit impressive range and varietyâlong poems, short lyrics, serial poems, poems inspired by visual artâand are richly attentive to the landscapes, both urban and wild, of her New Brunswick home. They voice a sense of urgency with respect to ecological crises and war; her poetic attention fixes unwaveringly on the smallest pebble on the coast of Fundy but is equally attuned to global patterns of destructive domination.
In her introduction âAs Opportunity for Grace, This Life May Serveâ, editor Jeanette Lynes discusses how Laneâs poetry integrates an ecopoetic vision with explorations of the artistâs task of mapping her world. Laneâs afterword reinforces her sense of the poetâs project as a form of mystical play, a search for patterns in the âunified disunitiesâ of all things.