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Dangerous Household Items
"David Orr is an authentic iconoclast. His criticism is exuberant and original. Dr. Johnson, my critical hero, urged us to clear our mind of cant. Orr has cleared his. He will enhance the perception of his readers." --Harold Bloom
"A poetry critic and poet himself, David Orr's work often explores a gray area of literary professionalism and process. A columnist for the New York Times Book Review. . . . Orr shows himself to be a reader interested in cutting through noise, particularly with the realities of writing and publishing in a popular culture." --Ploughshares
In his wry debut collection of poetry, celebrated critic David Orr ponders the dark underworld of the ordinary, as he traverses the suburban gothic landscape of modern America. Orr finds and names what's at the core of being human: sorrow, kindness, familial love, and memory. The poems are playful, fashioned of fables, familiar objects, and the supernatural, inviting every reader to enter in.
From "The Abduction"
. . . Later, he would wake each night screaming
In helpless confusion, but at the time
There was just the sun, the beach, the sun, the saltwater
And dark forms being kind.
Only a month
After the incident, having lost the skill
Of knowing what was real, he walked
Into headlights he had thought were his wife.
David Orr teaches at Cornell University in addition to serving as the poetry columnist for the New York Times Book Review. A native of South Carolina, he lives in Ithaca, New York.
"A poetry critic and poet himself, David Orr's work often explores a gray area of literary professionalism and process. A columnist for the New York Times Book Review. . . . Orr shows himself to be a reader interested in cutting through noise, particularly with the realities of writing and publishing in a popular culture." --Ploughshares
In his wry debut collection of poetry, celebrated critic David Orr ponders the dark underworld of the ordinary, as he traverses the suburban gothic landscape of modern America. Orr finds and names what's at the core of being human: sorrow, kindness, familial love, and memory. The poems are playful, fashioned of fables, familiar objects, and the supernatural, inviting every reader to enter in.
From "The Abduction"
. . . Later, he would wake each night screaming
In helpless confusion, but at the time
There was just the sun, the beach, the sun, the saltwater
And dark forms being kind.
Only a month
After the incident, having lost the skill
Of knowing what was real, he walked
Into headlights he had thought were his wife.
David Orr teaches at Cornell University in addition to serving as the poetry columnist for the New York Times Book Review. A native of South Carolina, he lives in Ithaca, New York.
- GenresPoetry
128 pages, Paperback
Published October 23, 2018
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About the author
David Orr
34 books43 followersDavid Orr is the poetry columnist for the New York Times Book Review. He is the winner of the Nona Balakian Prize from the National Book Critics Circle and the Editor’s Prize for Reviewing from Poetrymagazine. Orr’s writing has appeared in Poetry, Slate, The Believer, and Pleiades magazine. He holds a B.A. from Princeton and a J.D. from Yale Law School.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
April 26, 2019
When he fell in that garden and cut his hand
On broken glass from the vinegar bottle
He'd thrown in drunken anger years before
(He had reached for it eagerly that night,
Mistaking it for wine in the dark kitchen),
It was no great injury, and if he felt
Amid the pain a momentary longing
To echo the longing he'd felt back then,
As you might feel stumbling on an old photo
Of yourself beside a half-forgotten person
You once were drawn to as sunflowers are drawn
Toward their namesake, which is no flower,
This quickly passed as he came to recognize
Himself at two removes, and all at once.
—"Unexpected Meeting," David Orr
On broken glass from the vinegar bottle
He'd thrown in drunken anger years before
(He had reached for it eagerly that night,
Mistaking it for wine in the dark kitchen),
It was no great injury, and if he felt
Amid the pain a momentary longing
To echo the longing he'd felt back then,
As you might feel stumbling on an old photo
Of yourself beside a half-forgotten person
You once were drawn to as sunflowers are drawn
Toward their namesake, which is no flower,
This quickly passed as he came to recognize
Himself at two removes, and all at once.
—"Unexpected Meeting," David Orr
January 18, 2019
Initially, I wanted to love this collection. The first half of the book was an eclectic mixture of poems, focusing on themes of loss, sorrow, existence, and nature set in vignettes of everyday life: contemplatively gazing into an unused inflatable pool; renovating a house inherited when one's parent's died, a father's slow descent into dementia. I don't often read poetry, but this made me think that when we have less words to work with, they must work harder, striking a deeper chord in the reader.
The latter parts of Dangerous Household Items were a bit uneven, as one reviewer pointed out. There were a couple of fantasy-themed poems that didn't appeal to me as well as one about Dick Cheney in Italy based on a dream he had while in a coma, that seemed out of place.
The strength of Part I was enough for me to read more by this author.
The latter parts of Dangerous Household Items were a bit uneven, as one reviewer pointed out. There were a couple of fantasy-themed poems that didn't appeal to me as well as one about Dick Cheney in Italy based on a dream he had while in a coma, that seemed out of place.
The strength of Part I was enough for me to read more by this author.
March 20, 2020
This is a powerful collection of poems for mulling on a virus-induced homestay. Hard to believe it is a debut collection, let alone from a professional critic. Orr anchors the collection with poems lodged firmly in physical objects (his long poem that masks as instructions on separation and recycling is full of musical notes that are the clangs and dings of bottles and cans). One of my favorites involved tea steeped too long, of which a snippet:
The tea leaves smoldered in the cup.
The leaves smoldered and transformed the water
Into naked expressions of tea
And impassioned expressions of tea
And bitter expressions of tea.
The tea became displeasing to its maker
As it became increasingly itself.
Orr eschews most formal bounds, but there is a playfulness to many of his poems that seems to have its own subtle structure. He's best capturing those poignant moments when the familiar becomes estranged and unfamiliar:
.. it is as if we had discovered
In the middle of a private conversation
That there was no conversation, but rather
That the object of our address gad been
Responding to cues from some other,
Indiscernible speaker or theater, and what
We had believed to be behavior
Answerng our own requests had been
Something closer to coincidence ...
Many were the uncanny moments he creates in this slim collection. Highly recommend dipping in.
The tea leaves smoldered in the cup.
The leaves smoldered and transformed the water
Into naked expressions of tea
And impassioned expressions of tea
And bitter expressions of tea.
The tea became displeasing to its maker
As it became increasingly itself.
Orr eschews most formal bounds, but there is a playfulness to many of his poems that seems to have its own subtle structure. He's best capturing those poignant moments when the familiar becomes estranged and unfamiliar:
.. it is as if we had discovered
In the middle of a private conversation
That there was no conversation, but rather
That the object of our address gad been
Responding to cues from some other,
Indiscernible speaker or theater, and what
We had believed to be behavior
Answerng our own requests had been
Something closer to coincidence ...
Many were the uncanny moments he creates in this slim collection. Highly recommend dipping in.
March 15, 2021
Simple, unaffected poems
I love Orr's criticism and was curious to see what a collection from him might look like. In his criticism it's clear that he has an aversion for some of the poetry world's excesses--its flights of lyricism, overly poetic diction, and its addiction sometimes to grand generalities--and his poetry seems very concerned with eschewing these faults. I especially enjoyed the poems in the first part, which focus often on ordinary household objects. There's a narrative theme running through--the poetic narrator has moved into a house once occupied by his deceased father--and we sense some of the grief and the loss in how he writes about the physical environs.
I don't know. This book is more or less exactly what I like in a volume of poetry, so it's hard to judge, but I would say it was pretty good!
I love Orr's criticism and was curious to see what a collection from him might look like. In his criticism it's clear that he has an aversion for some of the poetry world's excesses--its flights of lyricism, overly poetic diction, and its addiction sometimes to grand generalities--and his poetry seems very concerned with eschewing these faults. I especially enjoyed the poems in the first part, which focus often on ordinary household objects. There's a narrative theme running through--the poetic narrator has moved into a house once occupied by his deceased father--and we sense some of the grief and the loss in how he writes about the physical environs.
I don't know. This book is more or less exactly what I like in a volume of poetry, so it's hard to judge, but I would say it was pretty good!
August 6, 2019
The NYT book review sold me on this one. From the author's bio, I can see why.
As a white middle class male, this book spoke to me. What a privilege.
Many of the poems ended with a "turn." Not a twist but a perspective shuffle. Some worked on me.
This collection has added context to to consider when reading the author's NYT reviews. I will keep it in mind when doing so in the future. And act accordingly.
But reading is lame. Reading about reading more so. I can, therefore, only imagine how horrible this must be for you right now. Sorry.
As a white middle class male, this book spoke to me. What a privilege.
Many of the poems ended with a "turn." Not a twist but a perspective shuffle. Some worked on me.
This collection has added context to to consider when reading the author's NYT reviews. I will keep it in mind when doing so in the future. And act accordingly.
But reading is lame. Reading about reading more so. I can, therefore, only imagine how horrible this must be for you right now. Sorry.
May 11, 2025
Favorite poem for obvious reasons was Tea. The Frog and Fata Morgana were the other standouts for me. While I really enjoyed part 1 and 2, part 3 felt a bit out of place to me in regards to the collection as a whole. Though I still enjoyed the poems in part 3 they didn't flow the same way the poems in part 1 really hit one after another.
January 31, 2019
I came around on this collection a bit, but it's still a 2.5 star read from me. Orr is just a bit too precious with most of these poems, making precarious skyrises out of tenuous metaphors about those titular household items.
December 26, 2018
Shows promise but very uneven collection - one poem nostalgic, the next about scientific inquiry; hard to point emotions in one direction.
July 28, 2019
Remarkable example that a critic/professor can also be a skillful poet in own right. Some incredible poems in the book.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews