You Are Still Alive

by William Stobb

Poetry. "Each poem in YOU ARE STILL ALIVE introduces itself with wistful, comic nihilism, but grows into a compassionate, fearless friend. It's as though the reader had been dropped into the mind of a loving, funny, humble, infinitely generous, nimble-minded Buddhist monk brought up on classic science fiction. The monk's musings honor the marvelous strangeness of each passing moment, never losing sight of the yawning maw of the dubious future. His contemplations are both heartening and sobering. The poems' animated cosmic hospitality bring our greatest and smallest concerns into perfectly calibrated relation as they ponder consciousness, technology, freedom, the future, the worldly, how to lead a virtuous life without being an annoying prig, how flawed and destructive humans are, how to be inventively fair-minded in at least five dimensions, and what life forms might come after us, stumbling on the ruins of our so-called civilization."--Amy Gerstler

"William Stobb's work moves elegantly between restlessness and peace, an appreciation for the bizarreness of life and a desire for simplicity. In balancing these extremes, his poems create a feeling of movement toward reconciliation, if not its realization. To repurpose his own words, he builds a space in which the 'emotional life / inflected by the brightness of wit / puts its arm around the intellect.' This book is a rare and beautiful accomplishment."--Bob Hicok

Genres: Poetry

81 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2019

Reviews

[Simone]

Poet Bob Hicok states that William Stobb’s latest book You Are Still Alive “is a rare and beautiful accomplishment”; and, Amy Gerstler declares that "Each poem in You Are Still Alive introduces itself with wistful, comic nihilism, but grows into a compassionate, fearless friend.” Their praise is not an exaggeration. You Are Still Alive, whose title is taken from the work of visual artist Landon Sheely, opens with the prologue “A Message From Your Mode” which offers up the indelible image of samurai who “studied virtue and dueled for honor / harboring live goldfish in their mouths.” This poem and others underscore that Stobb is a master of the dance between the conceptual and the concrete.

Whether he’s talking about a bobblehead Buddha or a psychic’s color catalog, there’s an expansive benevolence to his work even when it’s girded with cynicism. Showcasing a range of tonalities, Stobb is also effective in utilizing humor as in his poem “The Dream of Perfect Pants,” which pays homage to Dean Young. It is a beautiful example of playful experimentation and Robert Bly’s notion of “leaping poetry” as Stobb leaps joyfully, and meaningful, from a disco ball to space debris, later concluding:

As I became perfect, my pants became
messianic, attracting disciples.
I felt at that point the pants
should become robes, but no dice
--in this dream pants were pants—
so I sang karaoke and the disciples danced
to that Motown classic “Gimme Those Pants.”

Shifting tones yet again, his finale poem “Nocturne,” comes full circle with his book’s title and wistfully states “. . . please help me / into silence. This life is all I can remember / and I’m afraid to let it go.”

[Kyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is funny and sweet and smart. I really do adore it. Things should be fun when you read them. And this is fun when, you know, you read it. It is also fun when you think about it, and then when you read it again.