SoundMachine by Rachel Zucker
In her new book, Rachel Zucker questions if her family is a distraction from her poetry, or if her poetry is a distraction from her family.
Poetry
Be Recorder by Carmen Giménez Smith
Carmen Giménez Smith’s newest collection records the monolith, deconstructs it, and reassembles it as a world that looks a little more like one we can bear.
The Last Love Poem I Will Ever Write by Gregory Orr
The crystalized, perfectly-clear articulations of grief that begin the collection ring through it, making it impossible to read even the simplest lyric as light.
Nightingale by Paisley Rekdal
Paisley Rekdal’s sixth poetry collection explores the ways desire, pain, fear, and trauma transform us, often without our permission, and often into something unexpected.
The Tiny Journalist by Naomi Shihab Nye
Nye’s melding of voices in her new poetry collection is an activism of its own. Not only does this decision create a space for Palestinian mourning, it also actively works to shatter an us versus them mentality with regard to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Dissolve by Sherwin Bitsui
At the center of Dissolve, a single line repeats four times: “I breathe it in.” These inhalations encapsulate both the rich density and the immersive capacity of Bitsui’s work.
The Shallows by Stacey Lynn Brown
Though each of these poems embodies the heaviness of illness, their beauty is evinced in the pauses, the generous white spaces to be found in this book of poems.
Everyone Rides the Bus in a City of Losers by Jason Freure
But in Montreal, according to Freure’s speaker, everyone is a loser in the best sense of the word.
So Far So Good by Ursula K. Le Guin
Readers who rest in these meditative poems are sure to find the voice of the beloved Le Guin just as intriguing as they did in her prose.