Erdrich, Louise <br/><br/>
Baptism of desire  : poems 
/ Louise Erdrich. 
 - 1st ed. 
 - New York  : Harper & Row  , c1989. 
 - 78 p.  ; 24 cm. 
<br/><br/> This rich book will attract Erdrich fans. Like Jacklight, her first book of poems, it has tales of Potchikoo, a Chippewa Trickster, and of Mary Kroger, a butcher's wife. In the complex and masterful ``Hydra,'' a poem written during pregnancy, Erdrich addresses both the mythical serpent and her unborn child--``Blessed one, beating your tail across heaven,/ uncoiling through the length of my life''--and compares herself to both Mary and Eve. Writing ``Snake of hard hours, you are my poetry,'' she concludes, like Eve, that its place is ``at my ear.'' As in a sequence on saints and sacraments, Erdrich here appropriates and transforms the Catholic theology learned as a child. A graceful, deeply metaphoric sequence on gardening, childrearing, and marriage concludes the book. 
<br/><br/><label>ISBN: </label>9780060162139 
<br/><br/><label>LCCN: </label>89045650 
<br/><br/><label>Subjects--Topical Terms: </label><br/>Christian poetry, English<br/>Poetry, American
<br/><br/><label>LC Class. No.: </label>PS3555.R42  / B3 1989 
<br/><br/><label>Dewey Class. No.: </label>811.54 ERD