In this Book
- In the Home of the Famous Dead: Collected Poems
- Book
- 2015
- Published by: University of Arkansas Press
summary
In the Home of the Famous Dead will appeal to newcomers as well as to avid followers of Jo McDougall’s long career and complex work, providing valuable insights to the development of a poet’s signature, inimitable style. This collection presents work known for its sparse, compact language; surprising metaphor; humor; irony; idiomatic speech; and a stoic, sadly earned wisdom concerning death and loss. In McDougall’s world, folks making do with what they have take the stage to speak of, in the words of one critic, “the tangled mysteries of their faltering lives.” Her work has been described as having “excruciating honesty” (Gerald Stern), giving voice to the “ineffable emotions of plain people” (Judith Kitchen). Miller Williams notes that the work has “cleanness and clarity . . . in all the funk and smell of humanity.” This is the poetry of midwestern plains and southern botttomlands, of waitresses and professors, farmers and bankers, the disadvantaged and privileged alike. Often beginning in the personal and expanding to the universal, this poet takes note of the phenomenological world with a mixture of joy, despair, and awe, providing a haunting look at the cosmic irony of our existence. McDougall’s style is indescribable, yet wholly accessible. As Kelly Cherry notes, “Call it magic, call it art; either way [Jo McDougall’s work] is something like a miracle.”
Table of Contents
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- Acknowledgments
- pp. xxi-xxii
- from Women Who Marry Houses
- The Displaced
- p. 4
- The Woman in the Next Booth
- Silly Women
- p. 12
- Settlement
- p. 13
- The Bessemer
- p. 19
- Harlot Hag Dry Harpy
- p. 20
- Something, Anything
- p. 22
- Reporting Back
- p. 23
- The Bluebird Café
- p. 26
- The Menial
- p. 31
- Winter Room
- p. 33
- To a Man in Kansas
- p. 34
- The Paper Xylophone
- p. 39
- Becoming Invisible
- p. 45
- Between the Wars
- p. 49
- After the Quarrel
- p. 51
- The Other Side
- p. 53
- Hearing Tractors
- p. 54
- A Girl in a Sundress
- p. 57
- Dancing Man
- p. 58
- The Privileged
- p. 59
- Towns Facing Railroads
- A Friendly Town
- p. 65
- Burying My Mother
- p. 66
- Edge of America
- p. 69
- Small Town at Dusk
- p. 70
- A Stand of Pines
- p. 71
- How We Live
- p. 73
- In the Coffee Shops
- p. 74
- Item, Page Three
- p. 77
- I’ll Be Seeing You
- p. 79
- At the Marriott
- p. 80
- On Catalpa Street
- p. 81
- Buying a House
- p. 82
- Driving Kansas
- p. 84
- Neighborhood
- p. 87
- Dead Child
- p. 88
- Most of the Time
- p. 89
- His Funeral
- p. 94
- Surviving in Kansas
- p. 95
- Children’s Children
- p. 100
- Once in Winter
- p. 101
- Her Last Trick
- p. 104
- The First Warm Day
- p. 105
- Remodeling
- p. 106
- Humanities 113
- p. 109
- A Woman of Substance
- p. 110
- Night Flight, Delta #481
- p. 115
- Dropping a Line
- pp. 117-118
- From Darkening Porches
- Nights and Days
- p. 122
- Eight Years a Ghost
- p. 127
- The Time of Their Lives
- p. 128
- The Duplex
- pp. 131-132
- Just Off the Highway
- p. 134
- A Farmer Dies
- p. 135
- Needing Noise
- p. 138
- Dreaming the Kin
- p. 142
- Many Mansions
- p. 144
- In Ray’s Café
- p. 149
- My Mother’s Dead Dresses
- p. 151
- A Story to Tell
- pp. 156-157
- Everything You Wanted
- p. 159
- A Nice Town
- p. 161
- Driving Alone
- p. 165
- For All They Know
- p. 166
- A Beginning
- p. 167
- Buzzards Near Osawatomie
- p. 168
- Seeing Her
- p. 170
- War Bride 1943
- p. 171
- Baseball in America
- p. 172
- Burying My Father
- p. 176
- Long Lives
- p. 178
- Dirt
- Mockingbird
- p. 181
- Telling Time
- p. 182
- At a Daughter’s Grave
- p. 184
- Why I Get Up Each Day
- p. 185
- Standing at a New Grave
- p. 187
- Indulgences
- p. 190
- Glittering
- p. 191
- This Morning
- p. 192
- Kansas in Winter
- p. 193
- North of Cabot
- p. 198
- A Good Woman
- p. 211
- Going Back
- p. 215
- Having Just Met
- p. 217
- Love Story
- p. 219
- In Passing
- p. 221
- Courtly Love
- p. 223
- The Breakup
- p. 224
- At the Azure Sky Motel
- p. 225
- After Supper
- p. 226
- A Second Cup of Coffee
- p. 227
- The Good Hand
- p. 229
- Taking Chemotherapy
- p. 233
- Waiting Room
- pp. 234-235
- In No Time
- p. 237
- In a Neck of the Woods
- p. 238
- Inheritance
- p. 241
- At Summer’s End
- p. 242
- Tempting the Muse
- p. 243
- Intersection
- p. 245
- On the Brink
- p. 246
- Across Town
- p. 249
- The Order of Things
- p. 251
- What We Need
- pp. 257-258
- Satisfied with Havoc
- After Losing a Child
- p. 263
- Mothers and Daughters
- p. 265
- At Frog’s Trailer Park
- p. 266
- Paying Attention
- p. 271
- Walking in Woods
- p. 275
- On That Beautiful Shore
- p. 276
- The Slight
- p. 277
- Driving Highway 71
- p. 278
- The Crows of Mica Street
- p. 281
- Straightpins
- p. 282
- New Couple on the Block
- p. 283
- Cloud’s Lake
- p. 285
- Dissatisfied Life
- p. 303
- Snow in Arkansas
- p. 304
- At a Table for Six
- p. 306
- Parallel Lives
- p. 310
- Visiting My Daughter
- p. 312
- The Widow Speaks
- p. 314
- Mother’s Day
- p. 318
- Under an Arkansas Sky
- Answering the Question
- p. 329
- A Day’s Work
- p. 330
- Index of Poem Titles
- pp. 331-340
Additional Information
ISBN
9781610755603
Related ISBN(s)
9781557286307, 9781557289117
MARC Record
OCLC
908100686
Pages
363
Launched on MUSE
2015-08-14
Language
English
Open Access
No