Frank Bidart
A vital, searching new collection from one of finest American poets at work today,In â€œThose Nights,â€ Frank Bidart writes: â€œWe who could get / somewhere through / words through / sex could not.â€Â Words and sex, art and flesh: In ,Metaphysical Dog,, Bidart explores their nexus.Â The result stands among this deeply adventurous poetâ€™s most powerful and achievedÂ work, an emotionally naked, fearlessly candid journey through many of the central axes, the central conflicts, of his life, and ours.,Â Â Â Â  Near the end of the book, Bidart writes:,Â Â Â Â  In adolescence, you thought your work,Â Â Â Â  ancient work: to decipher at last,Â Â Â Â Â  human beingsâ€™ relation to God. Decipher,Â Â Â Â  love. To make what was once whole,Â Â Â Â  whole again: or to see,Â Â Â Â  why it never should have been thought whole.,Â Â Â Â  This â€œancient workâ€ reflects what the poet sees as fundamental in human feeling, what psychologists and mystics have called the â€œhunger for the Absoluteâ€â€”a hunger as fundamental as any physical hunger.Â This hunger must confront the elusiveness of the Absolute, our self-deluding, failed glimpses of it.Â The third section of the book is titled â€œHistory is a series of failed revelations.â€,Â Â Â Â  The result is one of the most fascinating and ambitious books of poetry in many years.,One of ,Publishers Weekly,'s Best Poetry Books of 2013,A ,New York Times ,Notable Book of 2013,An NPRÂ Best Book of 2013
Poetry,GLBT,Queer,LGBT,Contemporary,Fiction,LGBT,Gay,Philosophy
Metaphysical Dog