BROWN: POEMS, Kevin Young. Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 2018, Luis Alberto Urrea did such a fine job capturing this book in his 2018 New York Times review, that…well…why should I even try? Kevin Young’s necessary new book of witness creates a parade through time, and I love a parade. Especially one with such good […]
EVA-MARY, Linda McCarriston. Tri-Quarterly Books, Northwestern University, 2020 Ridge Avenue, Evanston, IL 60208, 1991, 78 pages $10.95 paper. A friend gave this book to me in 1993, the year my twins were born. I don’t know when I read it, though I know I eventually did. Since then—for most of the last thirty years—it has […]
GARDEN TIME, W. S. Merwin. Copper Canyon Press, Post Office Box 271, Port Townsend, Washington, 98368, 2016, 78 pages, $16 paper, www.coppercanyongpress.org. When I was in the MFA program at the University of Washington, I helped to bring W. S. Merwin to read as part of our Watermark Series, and I was one of a […]
GOLDENROD: POEMS, Maggie Smith. One Signal Publishers / Atria (an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc.), 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020, 2021, 116 pages, $20 hardcover. https://www.simonandschuster.com. I discovered Maggie Smith through her poetry, so I was surprised when a friend recommended the audio of Smith’s new memoir, You Could Make […]