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Ghost Estate
by William Wall

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William Wall’s Ghost Estate is a sustained and scathing threnody for the poet’s native Ireland, as poem after poem ululates the death of culture by probing the myriad economic and democratic failures that have befallen the Emerald Isle in the wake of...more

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How to Live on Bread and Music
by Jennifer K. Sweeney

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(full review)

As recipient of the 2009 James Laughlin Award of the Academy of American Poets, the only major American award for a second book of poetry, it would be easy to passively dismiss Jennifer K. Sweeney’s How to Live on Bread and Music as anot...more (full review)

As recipient of the 2009 James Laughlin Award of the Academy of American Poets, the only major American award for a second book of poetry, it would be easy to passively dismiss Jennifer K. Sweeney’s How to Live on Bread and Music as another collection in the long line of contest winners that swell our local bookstores’ shelves. Though it is exquisitely designed by the good folks at Perugia Press with stunning cover art furnished by the poet’s father, an accomplished painter, the book’s didactic title does it no favors; for those of us inclined to grumpiness, it is reminiscent of the imperative platitudes often found in the least inspired work of Mary Oliver. All of this snarky skepticism fades, however, as soon as one creases the cover open, as How to Live on Bread and Music is not only a volume of great range and depth, but is full of sonorous, deeply felt poems that evoke Marianne Moore’s famous adage that our best verse strive to create “a place for the genuine.”

“Nocturne,” a brief, apocalyptic lyric serves as the collection’s opener, and it makes for an appropriate tone-setter, with its allegorical dreamscape of “a blue city in mind” where a purgatorial pall is marked only by the presence of “a musician/who plays a harp without strings.” Sweeney’s “rippling canal” and “zeppelin sky,” much like her other atmospherics, are intentionally ambiguous—this is surely a place of latent violence, but also a place where “a lone streetlamp tends/its blue arc of light,” so it is not completely absent of hope. It all makes for a pleasant imagistic catalog, the sort of Surrealism-Lite that reminds one of Mark Strand or Jorie Graham, when the wallop comes in the poem’s abrupt final couplet: “Maybe you hear a song or maybe you don’t./That is the choice we are always making.” This swift exeunt from the poem’s hallucinatory realm, in addition to the blunt directness of the second person address, combine to make “Nocturne” a sucker-punch ars poetica that not only questions the reader’s expectations, but which fittingly introduces the candid, gripping, and widely varied poems that follow.

Though it is broken into five sections, How to Live on Bread and Music avoids goose-stepping to a predictable thematic march. True, many of the poems early in the collection address themes of childhood and innocence, such as “The Three Sisters” and “The Silence of Girls,” whereas motifs of gardening, domesticity, and locomotion develop later, but overall these poems echo and reverberate like voices in a canyon, so the sense of play and surprise are never lost. Another remarkable aspect of Sweeney’s book is her ability to express the full range of her voice. It is easy to see that the terse lyric is her default mode, especially in poems such as “Requiem for America” and “Death Valley”—the latter of which begins with the startling line “the desert is a woman with no ideas”—but narratives such as “Adolescence,” “How to Uproot a Tree,” and “White Shadow” benefit from the same local brilliances and musical compression of language.

Among the many impressive aspects of this volume, Sweeney’s ear is perhaps most noteworthy. Regardless of length or form, she writes a supple, resonant line that displays an acute attention to sound, which is a gift rarely seen or cherished among her contemporaries. (This reviewer should know, since he too is a product of Generation Irony.) In light of these many riches, then, it is easy to overlook Sweeney’s rare miss, such as the overwrought sequence “The Listeners,” that for all its ambition and muscle never quite unifies its loose collage of turntable allusions. Such missteps are few indeed, as How to Live on Bread and Music is an exquisite book that transcends our literary moment, and one hopes readers will hear its lush grace singing for many years to come.(less)

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No Permanent Scars
by Michael Hemery (Goodreads Author)

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(Full review)

The essays in Michael Hemery’s debut collection No Permanent Scars—published earlier this spring by Silenced Press—are a potent reminder of the young heart’s elasticity, for Hemery renders his working-class upbringing in suburban Ohio wi...more

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Selected Poems
by Mary Ruefle

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Though Mary Ruefle’s poems bear little influence of Frost, perhaps no contemporary American poet better embodies the great bard’s famous adage that a poem “begins in delight and ends in wisdom.” The recent recipient of the 2011 William Carlos William...more

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The Weather Stations
by Ryan Call

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In Season Six of Doctor Who, one of the most highly anticipated episodes was written by Neil Gaiman, the author known for his Sandman series along with his novels like American Gods and Coraline. In this episode, the Doctor and his companions Amy and...more

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The Salt Ecstasies
by James L. White

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It was with a dour scowl that I first eyed a slim, musty, and altogether grim copy of James L. White’s The Salt Ecstasies. I was juggling the rigors of professorship while completing my MFA, and White’s was one of a dozen inter-library loans (most of...more

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The Art of Description: World into Word
by Mark Doty

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Several years ago a poet-friend recounted a humorous anecdote about a creative writing professor he took as an undergraduate. A respected short-story writer, the prof was teaching an introductory course where English majors would write in all four mo...more

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Lighthead
by Terrance Hayes

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Any review of Terrance Hayes’s stunning new collection Lighthead—which recently won the National Book Award in poetry—must inevitably address the trajectory of American poetry, for his is one of the most dynamic and versatile voices among us. In a li...more

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The Orange Suitcase
by Joseph Riippi (Goodreads Author)

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Try to categorize Joseph Riippi’s second book— is it a novel? Is it a story? Is it one of those MFA copout novel-in-stories novels?— and you’re asking in the wrong direction. This is a question for marketers and sales people. The question for readers...more

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Emprise rated a book 5 of 5 stars Ghost Estate by William Wall	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
William Wall’s Ghost Estate is a sustained and scathing threnody for the poet’s native Ireland, as poem after poem ululates the death of culture by probing the myriad economic and democratic failures that have befallen the Emerald Isle in the wake of...more
Aug 22, 2012 10:37am · see review
Emprise added How to Live on Bread and Music by Jennifer K. Sweeney	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
(full review) As recipient of the 2009 James Laughlin Award of the Academy of American Poets, the only major American award for a second book of poetry, it would be easy to passively dismiss Jennifer K. Sweeney’s How to Live on Bread and Music as anot...more
Oct 18, 2011 04:30pm · see review
Emprise added No Permanent Scars by Michael Hemery (Goodreads Author)	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
(Full review) The essays in Michael Hemery’s debut collection No Permanent Scars—published earlier this spring by Silenced Press—are a potent reminder of the young heart’s elasticity, for Hemery renders his working-class upbringing in suburban Ohio wi...more
Oct 18, 2011 04:26pm · see review
Emprise added Selected Poems by Mary Ruefle	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Though Mary Ruefle’s poems bear little influence of Frost, perhaps no contemporary American poet better embodies the great bard’s famous adage that a poem “begins in delight and ends in wisdom.” The recent recipient of the 2011 William Carlos William...more
Oct 18, 2011 04:23pm · see review
Emprise added The Weather Stations by Ryan Call	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
In Season Six of Doctor Who, one of the most highly anticipated episodes was written by Neil Gaiman, the author known for his Sandman series along with his novels like American Gods and Coraline. In this episode, the Doctor and his companions Amy and...more
Oct 18, 2011 04:17pm · see review
Emprise added the Goodreads iOS app
Oct 07, 2011 08:36am
Emprise added The Salt Ecstasies by James L. White	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
It was with a dour scowl that I first eyed a slim, musty, and altogether grim copy of James L. White’s The Salt Ecstasies. I was juggling the rigors of professorship while completing my MFA, and White’s was one of a dozen inter-library loans (most of...more
Sep 26, 2011 08:46am · see review
Emprise added The Art of Description: World into Word by Mark Doty	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Several years ago a poet-friend recounted a humorous anecdote about a creative writing professor he took as an undergraduate. A respected short-story writer, the prof was teaching an introductory course where English majors would write in all four mo...more
Sep 26, 2011 07:57am · see review
Emprise added Lighthead by Terrance Hayes	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Any review of Terrance Hayes’s stunning new collection Lighthead—which recently won the National Book Award in poetry—must inevitably address the trajectory of American poetry, for his is one of the most dynamic and versatile voices among us. In a li...more
Sep 26, 2011 07:50am · see review
Emprise added The Orange Suitcase by Joseph Riippi (Goodreads Author)	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Try to categorize Joseph Riippi’s second book— is it a novel? Is it a story? Is it one of those MFA copout novel-in-stories novels?— and you’re asking in the wrong direction. This is a question for marketers and sales people. The question for readers...more
Sep 26, 2011 07:40am · see review

Emprise’s Profile

Emprise’s favorite books

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rssEmprise's Recent Updates

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Emprise’s Friends (389)

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Emprise's Recent Updates

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