Failure to Thrive
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
Poetry of ambivalence, humour, and doubt that belies a kind of optimism
Dumpster fires outside discount stores and rotting whale carcasses; optical illusions and memento mori—all “coming to you direct, / by way of this Rube Goldberg machine.” Failure to Thrive zigzags through excess, taking in the big picture through the lens of a pinhole camera. These poems ask us to lean into our senses, to “spend time loitering, slipping coins into attention’s slots, / anticipating the next big pay-off.”
Hip and cerebral, this witty collection is as quick to make fun of itself as it is to turn its humour outward, where false historians have free rein, answers come in the form of questions, and the apocalypse seems like a good time to knit a sweater. Suzannah Showler’s debut shows us how a failing world can be the site of aesthetic renewal rather than decline.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
"Please write to me of your success," Showler urges her readers in the poem "A Short and Useful Guide to Living in the World." It's an honest request success, or the lack thereof, is one of the central fixations of the poems in this collection, which unremittingly pursue "the next big pay-off." In this sense, Showler's verse mirrors the disaffection of her generation. Consider "Sucks to Be You and Other True Taunts," in which the speaker broadcasts her frustrations in a series of insults that range from churlish ("I know you are, but what am I?") to clever ("Regret has a nasty habit of going/ straight to the face.") The poems are distinguished by their cultural awareness, and Showler exploits sources such as television in her poem "Jeopardy," job postings in "Position: Monster" and search engines in "Confessions from the Driver of the Google Street View Car" without losing sight of the human ethos that defines modern living. It's a promising debut that ends on a hopeful note when she writes: "You're/ important. Please stay. Someone will be with you."
