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Title details for Showtime at the Ministry of Lost Causes by Cheryl Dumesnil - Available

Showtime at the Ministry of Lost Causes

by Cheryl Dumesnil
ebook
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The poems in <i>Showtime at the Ministry of Lost Causes</i> are survival songs, the tunes you whistle while walking through the Valley of Shadows, to keep your fears at bay and your spirit awake. The shadows here are many—cancer, poverty, a lost love, famine, suicide, war, an ever-encroaching existential angst. But so are the saving graces—a drag queen waitress whose "painted-on eyebrows arched like a bridge / toward starlight," "strawberries / grown fat around dimpled gold seeds," Pink Floyd's "'On the Turning Away' sent through my car / radio like the ghost voice of a beloved long dead," black phoebes rattling "winter / thistles, swollen throats percussing: / this is this is this is . . . " Showtime at the Ministry of Lost Causes reminds us that where there is shadow there must, necessarily, also be light.

  • Creators

  • Series

    Pitt Poetry

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    November 18, 2016

  • Formats

    • Kindle Book

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9780822982005
      • File size: 350 KB

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9780822982005
      • File size: 350 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Library Journal

      Starred review from October 15, 2016

      An Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize winner for In Praise of Falling, Dumesnil opens with the flight of a rock dove. "It's not the Holy Spirit," as the poem's title says, but relentlessly in-this-world Dumesnil concludes, "what better prayer// than this?" With deep, gorgeous simplicity, the poet reflects on the vagaries of life, from failed relationships to failed bank accounts ("Under Job Skills, / list: balloon animals, roller disco"); "Tampons: A Memoir" is a witty, tender account of growing into womanhood. In the end, Dumesnil is honest but affirmative; "Who needs a cathedral," she says, apostrophizing October and its light, and the collection ends on the line, "This is, this is, this is...." VERDICT Highly recommended.

      Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • Kindle Book
  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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