The new testament

The new testament

Jericho Brown

Book - 2014

""Erotic and grief-stricken, ministerial and playful, Brown offers his reader a journey unlike any other in contemporary poetry."-Rain Taxi"To read Jericho Brown's poems is to encounter devastating genius."-Claudia RankineIn the world of Jericho Brown's second book, disease runs through the body, violence runs through the neighborhood, memories run through the mind, trauma runs through generations. Almost eerily quiet in even the bluntest of poems, Brown gives us the ache of a throat that has yet to say the hardest thing-and the truth is coming on fast.Fairy TaleSay the shame I see inching like steam Along the streets will never seep Beneath the doors of this bedroom, And if it does, if we dare to breathe,... Tell me that though the world ends us, Lover, it cannot end our love Of narrative. Don't you have a story For me?-like the one you tell With fingers over my lips to keep me From sighing when-before the queen Is kidnapped-the prince bows To the enemy, handing over the horn Of his favorite unicorn like those men Brought, bought, and whipped until They accepted their masters' names. Jericho Brown worked as the speechwriter for the mayor of New Orleans before earning his PhD in creative writing and literature from the University of Houston. His first book, PLEASE (New Issues), won the American Book Award. He currently teaches at Emory University and lives in Atlanta, Georgia. "--

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Subjects
American poetry > 21st century.
Published
Port Townsend, Washington : Copper Canyon Press [2014]
Language
English
Main Author
Jericho Brown (-)
Item Description
"Lannan literary selection".
Physical Description
x, 73 pages ; 24 cm
ISBN
9781556594571
Contents unavailable.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Confident and sensitive, Brown's follow-up to his American Book Award-winning debut, PLEASE, signals his growing stature in the poetry world. He forms this collection around Biblical language and motifs, reworking them through the materiality and culture of modern America with particular sensitivity to gender, sexuality, and race. It's an audacious move in all its entanglements, but as brothers and lovers and gods resonate through one another, lines such as "I found myself bound to Him and bound to His/ Bidding" become full-bodied and evocative. While decidedly and beautifully political at times (in reverence and irreverence alike) Brown's grounding in biographical details and his hard-won investigation of love's powers emerge as powerfully as the surface themes. As the poem "Nativity" declares, "Lord, let even me/ And what the saints say is sin within/ My blood, which certainly shall see/ Death-see to it I mean-/ Let that sting/ Last and be transfigured." Brown is a poet of sure technique, even as an occasional line, such as the declaration "To believe in God is to love/ What none can see," falls flat in comparison to the collection's tender music. Lyric and sturdy, however, these poems earn consistent attention as they redefine survival in a wounded world. (Sept.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Review by Library Journal Review

Starred Review. Poems by American Book Award winner Brown (Please) have been described as "erotic and grief-stricken," and as "muscular and smart." In this book, the poet's "testament" is about love, survival, and redemption, and an experience that is imbued with a strong voice; a singing that is quietly insistent. His poems probe the violent yet intimate ways people intersect. "I cannot locate the origin/ Of slaughter, but I know/ How my own feels, that I live with it/ 'To get the living done." These durable proofs of one man's resilience aren't pretentious or purposefully obtuse. One of the pleasures of Brown's verses is his extraordinary use of line break, which enriches and propels the poem, offering surprise at every turn. "Will black men still love me/ If white men stop wanting me// Dead? Will white men stop/ Wanting me dead?" While Brown and his poetry are alive and vibrant, he reminds us, "We breathe until we don't./ Every last word is contagious." VERDICT Highly recommended for all poetry collections.-Karla Huston, Appleton, WI (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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