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Poems
by Tony Hoagland
The poems in Priest Turned Therapist Treats Fear of God turn Hoagland's clear-eyed vision toward the hidden spaces--and spaciousness--in the human predicament.
My heroes are the ones who don't say much.
They don't hug people they just met.
They don't play louder when confused.
They use plain language even when they listen.
Wisdom doesn't come to every Californian.
Chances are I too
will die with difficulty in the dark.
If you want to see a lost civilizaton,
why not look in the mirror?
If you want to talk about love, why not begin
with those marigolds you forgot to water?
--from "Real Estate"
Tony Hoagland's poems interrogate human nature and contemporary culture with an intimate and wild urgency, located somewhere between outrage, stand-up comedy, and grief. His new poems are no less observant of the human and the worldly, no less skeptical, and no less amusing, but they have drifted toward the greater depths of open emotion. Over six collections, Hoagland's poetry has gotten bigger, more tender, and more encompassing.
"Starred Review. Throughout, Hoagland's work is refreshingly accessible without compromising sophistication or a complexity of thought." - Publishers Weekly
"Starred Review. Hoagland imbues smooth narrative with irony and surreal humor to deliver an especially rewarding book." - Library Journal
"Whether expansive or brief as aphorism. ... the affect Hoagland conveys is often breathtaking." - Booklist
This information about Priest Turned Therapist Treats Fear of God was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Tony Hoagland is the author of five previous poetry collections, including Application for Release from the Dream and What Narcissism Means to Me, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
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