All in Poetry

Beowulf

Beowulf

Chris Mathers Jackson
Poetry, The Classics

Maria Dahvana Headley’s new translation of the iconic Old English poem, Beowulf (2020) presents modern readers with a perfect blend of direct translations of Old English phrases and hyperbolically contemporary verbiage. Indeed, she translate kenning (the compound word phrases frequently used in Old English poems) after kenning alongside words like “bro,” “hashtag,” and, yes, “fuck” (although the later may well have been frequently used among the warrior class of individuals depicted in Beowulf). What Headley presents is not traditional high poetry like that championed by many medievalist of yesteryear (among them the likes of Tolkien), but it is lyrical, delightfully readable, and very accessible. What’s more, it is arguably representative of the original feel of Beowulf’s oral roots. Alliterations and lyrical turns of phrase collide with 21st-century slang in Headley’s entertaining and approachable new translation of this oldest of English poems.

And Yet: Poems

And Yet: Poems

Chris Mathers Jackson
Poetry

It is precisely these sorts of modern mothering moments, among other aspects of 21st-century womanhood, that inspire the poetry of Kate Baer. And Yet: Poems (2022) is her second full-length book of poetry, and it goes on sale on November 8. As with her first collection, What Kind of Woman (2020), which became and instant number one New York Times bestseller, And Yet scrutinizes what it is to be a white, American, middle class woman at this moment. Middle age, parenting, marriage, self-image, sex, health: all of these have their moments under the bright lights that are Baer’s poems.

How To Fly (In Ten Thousand Easy Lessons) Review

How To Fly (In Ten Thousand Easy Lessons) Review

Chris Mathers Jackson
Poetry

Barbara Kingsolver’s How to Fly (In Ten Thousand Easy Lessons) (2020) is her first collection of poetry. Kingsolver is, of course, beloved for her fiction, respected for her nonfiction, and now we might add, applauded for her verse. It is a collection I encourage any lover of poetry, particularly poetry by women, to reach for; it is a collection that will sit beside Mary Oliver’s Devotions on my shelf, its pages gradually more and more worn.

Be Holding

Be Holding

Chris Mathers Jackson
Poetry, My List of Required Reads

Rarely does a book-length poem hold its reader as tenderly and intimately as Ross Gay’s Be Holding (2020) held me. I never would have thought I would encourage everyone I know to read an ode of sorts to basketball legend, Julius Erving (famously called Dr. J.), and yet here I sit, enthusiastically doing just that.