321 CHRONICLESnTerror. Returned to shapenHis thoughts and suffer thenwindburn historiesnOf city and animal and star.nHis hand is pure and alone.nLucretius, however, is not revitalizednby his daring, for the poem ends “Wensaw you in the white fountain of deliriumn/ Burning but not purified.”nThe other extreme of the terrestrialnspecks pointed out earlier are those innintergalactic space, the “nebula of accident”ninto which the [broken] sculptornthrusts his displaced hands, the stars inn”Latencies,” the “mealy light” whichnmay be “the afterglow of the giant /ndeath of some far legendary sun”n(“Windows”). For Lucretius such imagesnwould refer to the cold dispersal ofnmatter; Chappell, however, suggestsndiscovery and hope in his resolution ofnthose clusters. In “Message,” afternmoving from terror to sorrow, hisn”man” finds everything changed in thenhour of his most destructive grief:nHe ascendsna finer dimension of event, henfeels with sensesnnewly evolved the widenhorizons unknown till now.nHe is transformed head to foot,ntaproot to polestar.nHe breathes a new universe,nthe blinding whirlpoolngalaxies drift round him andnbegin to converse.nFinally, the “Forever Mountains” picturesnthe poet’s father ascending anmountain (suggestively named “Pisgah”)nwhich “possesses him.” Henbuilds a fire at twilight and “in thennight a granary of stars / Rises in thenwater and spreads from edge to edge.”nIn the morning he, too, “rises glad andnearly and goes his way.” The poet’snvision blurs with distance.nI see no more.nForever Mountain has becomena cloudnThat light turns gold, that windndislimns.nThe groundwork Chappell has laidnwith shattered matter, with myth andnfable, with the anachronistic perspectivenof Lucretius, prepares us for thenapotheoses — what appears as death isnpotentially transformation. Each characternremains elementally what he is.nhis components dispersed into newnconfigurations. The father’s ascent ofnPisgah suggests, too, that the processnmay not be as impersonal as Lucretiusnthought.nIn Source Fred Chappell renders hisnatomic vision visible at two extremesn(“taproot to polestar”) between whichnthe human species carries out its being,nits daily heroism, its sweet music, itsnlonging for rest. We can also choose,nthe alternatives imply, how we wish tonjoin the eternal smithereens. “Message”nand “Forever Mountain” suggestnthe desirable ways, preferable to “makingnit new” with erudite pastiche, or tonassembling nostalgic fragments tonshore us against ruin. Rats’ alley is notnnecessarily the King’s High Way.nThe GenuinenArticlenby Jane GreernGoing Over East: Rejections of anWoman Rancher by Linda M.nHasselstrom, Golden, CO: Fulcrum,nInc.; $13.95.nLinda Hasselstrom is a friend of mine,nalthough we don’t write often or knowneach other well. I visited her SouthnDakota ranch, between the Black HOlsnand the Badlands, only once, six yearsnago, at which time I had the unwittingnbad manners to ask her how much landnshe owned. It was an adventure I’llnalways remember warmly, and readingnthis book was like sitting at Linda’snkitchen table and drinking coffee fromnher Thermos. The winner of Fulcrum’snfirst American Writing Award, GoingnOver East is an easy ride, the best thingnyet from this old pro. It’s quintessentialnHasselstrom (pronounced HAY’-selstrum)n— forthright and serious, withnjust enough humor, tenderness, andngall to keep it as interesting as she is.nThe qualifier “woman” in thenbook’s subtitle is redundant: the book isnnot a “woman’s book” nor is it about an”woman rancher” in any but the mostntechnical sense. Hasselstrom is simply anrancher—and a petite, fine-boned onenat that. Not born to ranching — shenwas adopted by her mother’s new husband,na rancher, when she was nine —nshe was nonetheless born to ranch.nnnAfter college and grad school, shenreturned home to work the place withnher adoptive father and, later, with hernhusband. Had there been no father tonreturn home to, and no terrific man tonfall in love with and marry, I amnconvinced that she would be therennonetheless in the mud and heat andncold, pulling bloody calves, buildingnher own house, fixing her own machinery,nlearning to use her word processornin her spare time. This woman isnthe genuine article.nFor those city-dwellers who like toneat junk food, who waste water andnfuel and rhapsodize about the romancenof the West, she has undisguised contempt.n”Broad generalities and shallowntheories confuse and anger me,” shenwrites. “Reality hinges on practicality,non knowledge that has daily use. Manynpeople here dehorn and castrate calvesnjust before or after the new moon toncut down on bleeding, butcher duringnthe first three days after the full moonnfor tender meat, harvest and kill weedsnwhen the moon is old, in its third ornfourth quarter. This is reality, the realnWest — sturdily defying the shallowntheories dreamed up by metropolitannthinkers in high-rises, people whosenwell-shod feet and clean hands neverntouch earth or blood.”nApparently, she doesn’t think muchnof any life-style but her own. While shenmakes me want to defend mine, aspectsnof which are indefensible, it’s anrelief to have someone like her, fornonce, give the rest of us a swift kick.nWe’re all used to being criticized—ornworse, patronized — by idiots: thenpeaceniks and feminists and “educators”nof the world. An idiot is thenantithesis of what Linda Hasselstromnis. She knows what she’s seen. City folkncan’t be trusted not to trespass on hernland, shoot her cows for sport, andnleave her gates open. Government andnbig business? The less said about them,nthe better. What matters is taking carenof your own people, land, livestock,nneighbors. And working hard at something,nand frugality, appreciating whatnyou’ve been given. All the rest isngarden fertilizer.nHad you noticed that all the goodnwriting with what English teachers andnbook reviewers call a “sense of place”ncame from Southern writers — andnthat most of them are dead? Thinknagain. This woman is so hard in loven