{"product_id":"wade-in-the-water-poems-9781555978365","title":"Wade in the Water: Poems","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eShortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFinalist for the Forward Prize for Best Collection\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe extraordinary new poetry collection by Tracy K. Smith, the Poet Laureate of the United States\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEven the men in black armor, the ones\u003cbr\u003eJangling handcuffs and keys, what else\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAre they so buffered against, if not love's blade\u003cbr\u003eSizing up the heart's familiar meat?\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWe watch and grieve. We sleep, stir, eat.\u003cbr\u003eLove: the heart sliced open, gutted, clean.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLove: naked almost in the everlasting street, \u003cbr\u003eSkirt lifted by a different kind of breeze.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e--from \"Unrest in Baton Rouge\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eWade in the Water\u003c\/i\u003e, Tracy K. Smith boldly ties America's contemporary moment both to our nation's fraught founding history and to a sense of the spirit, the everlasting. These are poems of sliding scale: some capture a flicker of song or memory; some collage an array of documents and voices; and some push past the known world into the haunted, the holy. Smith's signature voice--inquisitive, lyrical, and wry--turns over what it means to be a citizen, a mother, and an artist in a culture arbitrated by wealth, men, and violence. Here, private utterance becomes part of a larger choral arrangement as the collection widens to include erasures of \u003ci\u003eThe Declaration of Independence\u003c\/i\u003e and the correspondence between slave owners, a found poem comprised of evidence of corporate pollution and accounts of near-death experiences, a sequence of letters written by African Americans enlisted in the Civil War, and the survivors' reports of recent immigrants and refugees. \u003ci\u003eWade in the Water\u003c\/i\u003e is a potent and luminous book by one of America's essential poets.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Smith, Tracy K.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 03\/26\/2019\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Graywolf Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781555978365\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 96\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.25lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.80h x 5.90w x 0.50d","brand":"Tracy K. Smith","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":32749416906827,"sku":"9781555978365","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0021\/1697\/6715\/products\/img_0fb5f2de-f53c-4e39-bb13-33a3bfe81c76.jpg?v=1597789097","url":"https:\/\/blackbookstore.com\/products\/wade-in-the-water-poems-9781555978365","provider":"Black Bookstore","version":"1.0","type":"link"}