How Robert Hass Sees "Spring"

"[Robert Hass'] genius lies in capturing not a situation but a consciousness of the situation. That shared consciousness is Hass' bridge to his readers, creating an intimate voice that feels open and unguarded--even when it's not. It also imbues Hass' life with a sense of familiarity, if not an outright pang of recognition. From the early poem "Spring":

We bought great ornamental oranges,
Mexican cookies, a fragrant yellow tea.
Browsed the bookstores. You
asked mildly, "Bob, who is Ugo Betti?"
A bearded bird-like man
(he looked like a Russian priest
with imperial bearing
and a black ransacked raincoat)
turned to us, cleared
his cultural throat, and
told us both interminably
who Ugo Betti was. The slow
filtering of sun through windows
glazed to gold the silky hair
along your arms. ...

These are not particularly fresh images: The tea is fragrant, the bookstore pedant has a beard, the afternoon light is gold. Hass, a student of the haiku masters, doesn't strain over description. His skill lies in the pacing of thought and images, which mimics the way an afternoon like this settles into memory—down to that distracted glance at the window."

-Nathan Heller