Book

Stone, Ruth, author.

Ordinary words / Ruth Stone.

1st ed.

Ashfield, Mass. : Paris Press, ©1999.

74 pages ; 24 cm

Ordinary Words, Ruth Stone's new collection of poems, is the recipient of The Academy of American Poets Eric Mathieu King Award. Written between 1995 and 1998, this collection of formal and free verse profoundly responds to our century's closure. Poems take place in trailer parks and trains traveling through Texas; her heroes are plumbers, dead uncles, the teenage daughters of struggling single mothers. The poet speaks to other poets and poetry lovers, as well as to individuals intimidated and unfamiliar with poetry. Stone speaks with candor and humor about current events and the human condition. Ordinary Words weaves confrontations of racism, poverty, aging, and the environment into poems of vibrant, direct language and stunning lyricism. "Mother Poet" to our most famous contemporary poets, Ruth Stone shows that poetry can be food, oxygen, and comfort through the love, danger, and despair of everyday life.

Poetry -- Women authors.

Poetry.

National Book Critics Circle Award winner

Good Advice -- Up There -- Words -- This -- The Dark -- Summing It Up -- 1941 -- How They Got Her to Quiet Down -- So What -- Madison in the Mid-Sixties -- Repetition -- Perhaps -- Echoes and Shadows -- Earthquake -- Male Gorillas -- Never -- An Education in the Eighties -- Absence Proves Nothing -- So What's Wrong? -- Relatives -- Strands -- Can Cranes Cogitate? -- Aesthetics of the Cattle Farm -- Incredible Buys In -- Light Conclusions -- Uncle Cal on Fashions -- Yes, Think -- Hummingbirds -- The Ways of Daughters -- Then -- Ordinary Words -- When -- Patience -- One Thought -- Residue -- Sorting It Out -- The Trade-Off -- Romance -- Reading -- With Love -- So Be It -- In the Arboretum -- Overnight Guest -- All in Time -- Schmaltz -- The Trinity -- A Moment -- Ventriloquist -- This Space -- Unspeakable -- Vermont Nature -- Prefab -- I Meet Them -- At McDonald's in Rutland -- The Word Though as a Coupler -- Etc. -- Sitcom on the Greyhound in Rutland, Vermont -- On the Street -- At the Museum, 1938 -- Speculation -- Bottled Water -- Western Purdah, Inc. -- Empathy Again -- Boom -- Moving Right Along -- A Little Chart -- Prayer of Descending Order.

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