WADE IN THE WATER, Tracy K. Smith. Graywolf Press, 250 Third Avenue North, Suite 600, Minneapolis, MN 55401, 2019, 96 pages, $16 paper, www.graywolfpress.org. For my last poet in #nationalpoetrymonth, this book is too perfect. Here’s Graywolf Press’s description: In Wade in the Water, Pulitzer Prize winner Tracy K. Smith boldly ties America’s contemporary moment both […]
THE DAUGHTERS OF ELDERLY WOMEN, Brenda Miller. Floating Bridge Press, 909 NE 43rd St, $205, Seattle WA 98105, 2020, 41 pages, $10, paper, www.floatingbridgepress.org. Not only are these poems I wish I had written, but they are poems I should have written. It’s a meditative, almost spiritual collection, but busy, too—like a care-taking daughter—with minutiae. […]
SIGHT LINES, Arthur Sze. Copper Canyon Press, PO Box 271, Port Townsend, WA 98368, 2019, 70 pages, $16 paper, www.coppercanyonpress.org. Today I started a couple different poetry books and for some reason—I don’t blame the poets—couldn’t get any traction. Then I stumbled across this one, sat down, and read it all the way through. Arthur […]
INSTRUCTIONS FOR MY MOTHER’S FUNERAL, Laura Read. University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh Pa 15260, 2012, 104 pages, $17 paper, https://upittpress.org. The intimacy of this book of poems is searing. A father dies, a mother remarries. A child is uprooted. (And so much more.) Then life goes on. A life in three parts. Swoon-worthy writing here, […]