Dirge for an Imaginary World

by Matthew Buckley Smith

Poetry. DIRGE FOR AN IMAGINARY WORLD is the winner of the 2011 Able Muse Book Award, selected by Andrew Hudgins. These are poems of breathtaking craftsmanship that find inspiration in the simplicity of the quotidian, or the perplexity of the grand. Smith is equally at ease musing about Neanderthals or God as he is with a ballet exam or highway medians. These poems of personal and universal introspection are filled with grace, and sparkle with abundant intelligence and wit. This masterful debut collection is an event to celebrate.

"In this deeply impressive debut volume of poetry, DIRGE FOR AN IMAGINARY WORLD, Matthew Buckley Smith delivers a remarkable range of deft formal schemes, temporal movements, and varied settings. We encounter sonnets, couplets, quatrains, Sapphics, sestets and so forth written with a slick, delightful merging of technical expertise and smooth contemporary rhythms. The range of subjects is equally and as charmingly eclectic, from Neanderthals, Dante, Vermeer, for instance, to College Football Mascots, Highway Mediums, and Spring Ballet Exams. Mental and linguistic agility generously challenge the reader in poem after poem."—Greg Williamson, from the Foreward

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published April 10, 2012

About the author

Matthew Buckley Smith was born in Atlanta, Georgia. He is the winner of the Able Muse Book Award, 2011, for his Manuscript, Dirge for an Imaginary World, forthcoming from Able Muse Press, Spring 2012. He earned his MFA in poetry at the Johns Hopkins University. His poems have appeared in various magazines, including Beloit Poetry Journal, Commonweal, Iron Horse Literary Review, Measure, The Alabama Literary Review, Think Journal, and Best American Poetry 2011. His poetry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He lives in Baltimore with his wife, Joanna.

Reviews

[Josh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amazed by the diversity of style and the playful, honest way that the deepest pains are examined. A good reminder that even in the midst of losing our youth, our loves, or our lives are tiny ironies and funny coincidences that can make us laugh and bring us to the subtle hope that outlines every disillusionment.