Poetry
novels, fine art, and nightmares; Beer acts
as the strange documentarian recording the
bizarre, beautiful, and disturbing habits of
creatures for whom subterfuge and mimicry are a means of survival.
We Mammals in Hospitable Times by
Jynne Dilling Martin (Feb. 3, paper,
$15.95, ISBN 978-0-88748-596-1). This
highly anticipated debut finds its narrator
rushing headlong into a dangerous planet
wanting desperately to make sense of all
the perplexing behavior on view and offering poems with armfuls of empathy, curiosity, and spiritual force.
CITY LIGHTS
On Time: Poems 2005–2014 by Joanne
Kyger (Apr. 14, paper, $15.95, ISBN 978-
0-87286-680-5). Kyger’s first full-length
collection of poetry in nearly a decade
blends the personal and the political, the
natural and the spiritual in a restless quest
for sanity. A major new collection from one
of the most significant poets of the San
Francisco Renaissance.
Women in Public by Elaine Kahn (Apr.
14, paper, $13.95, ISBN 978-0-87286-
681-2). In this debut full-length collection
by poet/musician Kahn, personal philoso-phies and collective admissions are put
through the corporeal grinder, harnessing
the sensual as a medium for the cerebral in
order to negotiate the “feminine condition”
of being simultaneously othered and consumed.
COACH HOUSE
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Asbestos Heights by David McGimpsey
(Apr. 14, paper, $17.95, ISBN 978-1-
55245-309-4). Implored to be “classy” and
“real” for once, McGimpsey looks to all
things “poetic,” like birds and history, and
instead amps up his trademark sideswiping
of formal rhetoric with pop-culture verve
to find a bold Late Night Petrarchan spirit.
COFFEE HOUSE
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Alone and Not Alone by Ron Padgett
(May 12, paper, $16, ISBN 978-1-56689-
401-2). From one of contemporary poetry’s
living masters comes a collection of wry,
Padgett’s skills as a poet
remain, continuously remind-
ing us that the world may be
seen in a clearer and more
generous light.
Null Set by Ted Mathys
(June 9, paper, $16, ISBN
978-1-56689-403-6) collects
the obsessive possibilities
that rise when we give them
the space: odd jobs, troublemaking, and farmboy rambling, all in
dialogue with mathematics, Faulkner, or
other poets. Mathys builds reflections that
lead to dark, complex work that’s provocative, rhythmic, and a little sly.
COPPER CANYON
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The News by Jeffrey Brown (May 12,
paper, $16, ISBN 978-1-55659-480-9).
Emmy-award winning journalist Brown
explores the intersections between politics
and poetry in his debut. From a high-secu-rity prison in Arizona, a West Point classroom, a slum in Haiti, Brown’s poems share
the perspectives of inmates, cadets, and
survivors.
Shirt in Heaven by Jean Valentine (May
12, paper, $16, ISBN 978-1-55659-478-
6). Quietly marked by elegy and memory,
Valentine’s 13th book is empowered by her
signature clear music and compassion.
Drawing on the Tibetan word bardo, “
intermediate state,” National Book Award–
winner Valentine explores love and loss in
the dreamlike liminal space of memory.
War of the Foxes by Richard Siken (Apr.
14, paper, $17, ISBN 978-1-55659-477-9).
In this much-anticipated second book,
Siken, winner of the 2004 Yale Younger
Poets’ prize, seeks definite answers to indefinite questions: what it means to be called
to make—whether it be a self, love, war, or
art—and what it means to answer that call.
What About This: The Collected
Poems of Frank Stanford by Frank
Stanford, intro. by Dean Young (Apr. 14,
hardcover, $40, ISBN 978-1-55659-468-
7). This 600-plus-page book highlights the
arc of Stanford’s all-too-brief and incandes-
cently brilliant career.
Despite critical praise and
near-mythic status as a poet,
Stanford’s oeuvre has never
fully been unified until now.
COUNTERPOINT
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This Present Moment:
New Poems by Gary Snyder
(Apr. 14, hardcover, $24,
ISBN 978-1-61902-524-0).
For his first collection of new
poems since 2004, Snyder finds himself
ranging over the planet. From the Dolomites to Lake Tahoe, from Paris to Tuscany
to Delphi, from Santa Fe to Sella Pass, Snyder lays out a map of the last decade.
ECCO
Breezeway: New Poems by John Ashbery (May 12, hardcover, $22.99, ISBN
978-0-06-238702-8). Demonstrating his
extraordinary command of language and
his ability to move fluidly and elegantly
between wide-ranging thoughts and ideas,
Ashbery shows that he is a virtuoso fluent
in diverse styles and tones of language.
From the New World: Poems 1976–
2014 by Jorie Graham (Feb. 17, hardcover,
$29.99, ISBN 978-0-06-231540-3).
Pulitzer Prize–winner Graham returns
with a new selection, this time from 11
volumes, including previously unpublished work, which, in its breathtaking
overview, illuminates the unfolding of her
signature ethical and ecopolitical concerns,
as well as her deft exploration of mythology, history, and love.
The Lunatic: Poems by Charles Simic
(Apr. 7, hardcover, $22.99, ISBN 978-0-
06-236474-6). This latest from the celebrated Simic demonstrates his revered signature style—a mix of understated brilliance, wry melancholy, and sardonic wit—
in luminous poems that range in subject
from mortality to personal ads, from the
simple wonders of nature to his childhood
in war-torn Yugoslavia.
FARRAR, STRAUS AND GIROUX
Heaven: Poems by Rowan Ricardo
Phillips (June 16, hardcover, $23, ISBN
