The Gilded Auction Block: Poems

by Shane McCrae

An incisive new collection of poetry on political and contemporary themes

I’m made of murderers I’m made
Of nobodies and immigrants and the poor

and a whole / Family the mother’s
liver and her lungs

In The Gilded Auction Block , the acclaimed poet Shane McCrae considers the present moment in America on its own terms as well as for what it says about the American project and Americans themselves. In the book’s four sections, McCrae alternately responds directly to Donald Trump and contextualizes him historically and personally, exploding the illusions of freedom of both black and white Americans. A moving, incisive, and frightening exploration of both the legacy and the current state of white supremacy in this country, The Gilded Auction Block is a book about the present that reaches into the past and stretches toward the future.

Genres: Poetry, Audiobook, Race

112 pages, Hardcover

First published February 12, 2019

Reviews

[Bonnie Morse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Books like this make me wish I was a better reviewer. And a better writer. And just a better person in general. Someone worthy of trying to discuss this caliber of writing. I don't have the words to describe the beauty and eloquence of Shane McCrae's poems, existing in that delicate intersection of politics, race, and identity. There is nothing that anyone can say for or about him that he can't say more effectively for himself, in his own powerful, unique verse.

[Carl Waluconis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Has anything so many twists, turns, and lacerations as the history of "race" in America? In his latest collection of poems,Shane McCrae continues to explore current life in America. Raised by a white, racist Grandmother, he sits in the middle of the divide:
As I had thought you loved me grand-
mother for what love ever have
I fought so fiercely. as I fought
To keep the harm you did to me
McCrae breaks through the standard uses of syntax to ratchet out meaning in a new way - to explore issues in new ways. He includes references to TS Eliot and Paul Dunbar, locating his poems in the history of poetry and Humanities. In "The Role of the Negro in the Work of Art", he addresses the dilemma he faces when doing this:
Bright light preserver and destroyer when
I am seen how will I survive being seen
The book concludes with a long 4-part poem that awaits serious, large interpretations. The title of the last part is a kind of theme - "The Monster That Is America Dreams of America".

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent collection. I loved the rhythm and cadence of these poems. I had to skip The Hell Poem section in this reading.

[Meagan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was such a powerful collection. The Hell Poem is something I’ll be returning to...frequently, I think.

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was lucky to have read these occasional poems -- occasioned in the microaggression of having to view any given moment through a racial lens; that contingency; that gildedness; -- while sitting in a public library, watching generally older adults contending with the eros of their tutoring likely teen students by using (instrumentalizing, like a block) the library's exposure to the eyes of all. Myriad subjects taken up in rudimentary eros gave the myriad subject-positions of McCrae's speakers a haunted heuristic in our shared vampire demos. A book very much of our time.

[Juliano · Rating 5 out of 5]

“America I was driving when I heard you / Had died I swerved into a ditch and wept / In the dream I dreamed unconscious in the ditch”. In Shane McCrae’s poetry collection The Gilded Auction Block, America-as-concept is cajoled, appealed to/for, confounded, antagonised, anatomised and atomised to an incredible, unbelievable extent. McCrae sees America as the joke it is, and satirises it for all its worth: in a hilarious and self-evident poem, ‘Sonnet for Desiree Fairooz Prosecuted for Laughing at Jeff Sessions’ Confirmation Hearing’, McCrae writes “tell it again / America / tell me the one I’m living”, a good baseline for the tone of the rest of collection, which is both self-aware and totally bewildered by the constant joke. That said, it’s not like McCrae is shying away from the darkness or couching everything in jokes, perfectly perceptive of such images as a river (and a nation, and a person) as “preserver and destroyer when / I am seen how / will I survive being seen”, a compelling and confounding run-on of metaphor into helpless questioning. McCrae is a visionary in the truest sense, his sense of the world, its violence and darkness and odd promise, fundamentally poetic: “Tell me where is the sea where / is the ocean / I cross to emigrate to you / I see / It nowhere / though it closes over me” — aching with truth. And there’s the collection’s lynchpin, ‘The Hell Poem’, among the best long poems I’ve read, made vivid by Christine Sajecki’s paintings.

[Carla · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow ... I am very happy to have heard of Shane McCrae and to have read his poetry - first was Language of My Captor and now The Gilded Auction Block. One of the most personally compelling poems from this new collection is Seawhere. The following is a insightful, lyrical, sad and great piece of perty:

 
The problem isn't that I don't see faces
Like mine it's that I don't see inner lives
Like mine I mean the way a person's inner
Life is expressed partly by the public spaces.

I want to say that a few lines here and there seem too pat - 'Once someone saw my double in Peru' in Seawhere, as an example. But my concerns are tentative. I have yet to feel comfortable on poetic style other than to praise it.

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

3/31

This collection I picked up at a used bookstore and now I have a problem. I am going to have to pick up McCrae's other books. This collection is metrical and tight, and formal in a way that doesn't feel formal but holds up when you put the poems up to the light. Poems that have historical reckoning particularly as that history pertains to race, and McCrae is careful to point out that this history is not history but is only the present. Again. And then again. He takes on the early Trump years. As this came out in 2019, it is clear, then, the next collection will have even more to hold up to his strong poetic light.

#SealeyChallenge #ShaneMcCrae

From “The President Visits the Storm”

America you’re what a turnout great
Crowd a great crowd big smiles America
The hurricane is everywhere but here an
Important man is talking here Ameri-
ca the important president is talking

[Charlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first section of The Gilded Auction Block, that most directly attends to the current state of America, made me feel a little skeptical. It's still good stuff, just very on the nose. That being said, the mournful swagger of something like Black Joe Arpaio is something to behold. Where the book transcends to a whole nother level, though, is the 30-page-long Hell Poem, which is confounding, upsetting, and transporting.

[Stewart Lindstrom · Rating 5 out of 5]

McCrae's poetry will doubtless stand the test of time. His stylistic innovations are marvelous, and, even while his shorter poems are occasional poems, each written for a specific moment within the Trump presidency, they manage to be incredibly universal.
The long poem, which makes up a good half of the book, however, is the main attraction, weaving dream sequence with the Inferno with the Hell of America itself. This is strange, beautiful, and strangely beautiful book.

[Pearse Anderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Blood was one of my favorite poetry of the past few years, but for me The Gilded Auction Block fell flat, perhaps because of how it focuses on responding to Trump or how it doesn't hold a historical narrative up like Blood did. I'm excited to see McCrae's next book!

Connection: the first writing class I ever went to in Oberlin was his poetry class; he later advised my roommate, read from this book at Tin House while I was there, and impacted my CRWR department before he left for Columbia.

[Mitchel · Rating 3 out of 5]

While not as strong as "In the Language of My Captor," McRae is still a formidable poet. "The Hell Poem" makes up the bulk of the book, and it begins and ends quite compellingly, but I think it loses itself in the middle. At his best, McRae's poems reveal themselves after two or three readings; you have to work to unlock them, and patience is key. My favorites include "After a Photograph of a Town House...", "Remembering My White Grandmother...", and "Seawhere."

[Suzanne Ondrus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very interesting poetic form of breaking the line in the middle with a few spaces and of having jarring speech that has you re-reading, sort of like tripping. "Seawhere" was one of my favorite poems about others' perception of the speaker's identity and his observation that the problem is that "I don't see inner lives like mine"(41)

[M · Rating 4 out of 5]

I rewrote my review three times in attempts to not give spoilers. All I can say is read this fantastic, dark, surreal collage that illustrates the biting truths about American culture and the afterlife.

[ems · Rating 5 out of 5]

first heard on new yorker poetry podcast. i tend to dislike poetry that uses white spaces/line breaks in ways that feel artificial, so the fact that i heard the author before reading was probably helpful here. these poems are so great. i should get over that.

[Simon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting, evocative, makes me want to lean more into his work (1st one read). Finding reviews of this mostly unhelpful in wrapping my mind around it, so glad I can join the discussion of it coming up.

[Leonard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unusual poems with a unique rhythm. Interesting ideas in poems that barely scratch the surface of their topic.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

#Question
What is Trump doing in the Inferno?

My Thoughts

[Tauwan Patterson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wonderfully piercing and thought provoking set. Much love.

[atito · Rating 4 out of 5]

hell poem!!! oh my gosh!

[D.J. Desmond · Rating 4 out of 5]

Powerful writer. Ready to read more of his writing and perspective

[•°☆ Annabelle ☆°• · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 ✩'s

[Kevin Pal · Rating 1 out of 5]

Sadly, The Gilded Auction Block: Poems was one of the worst collections of poetry I have ever purchased and read. While the book was recommended to me, I would not share that kind of similar recommendation with anyone.

[Jacob]

Petition for a spin-off book starring the robot bird from “The Hell Poem”