Purchase: Poems [Paperback]

Purchaseis for those who are grieving, who feel frightened by the world’s meanness, who are solitary. It is for those who, even in the midst of mourning, find themselves distracted from despair by the natural world. It is for everyone looking to find comfort and understanding. From a hidden river in upstate New York to a massive flood in Kentucky, currents of all strengths run through these poems, taking the reader through grief, estrangement, and the too-often unseen interiority of Black women, landing at a new perspective, the light of faith dawning. A new collection of poetry from the author of the National Book Award finalist OPEN INTERVALPriae for] Open Interval [:
 
“What joy to enter the universe Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon wills into being. In]Open Interval[Jimi Hendrix, Robert Hass, Rilke, Bearden, John Goodricke, blues, desire, longing, supernovas, and more are all held together with lyrical daring and fierce imagination. Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon invents a new world to reveal to us the secret workings of the old.”
 
—Cornelius Eady, author of706 Union Ave: Memphis Sessions
 
 
“‘Teach the sonnet’s a cell’ says the speaker in one of Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon’s compelling new poems, as she prepares to teach poetry to inmates at a New York State prison, ‘now try to escape–’. This poet’s astute and various formal choices perform exactly that work, containing the poem then constructing an opportunity for the splendidly intelligent maker of these artful forms to step into the light.] Open Interval [not only confirms the promise of Van Clief-Stefanon’s first book but takes her work to startling new heights.”
 
—Mark Doty, author ofWhat Is the Grass: Walt Whitman in My Life
 
 
“Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon asseln