Praise Nothing: Poems

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Grateful acknowledgment is made to the editors of the publications where these poems first appeared, sometimes in slightly different form:  Poems (“Praise Nothing”), Apalachee Review (“When I Say Hymn” and “Wash ’n’ Shop”), Briar Cliff Review (“Dawn above Sacred Heart”), The Canary (“Yardscape Diagram, Good Friday”), Carnelian (“Equinoctial”), Center (“Doxology”), Copper Nickel (“A Force Too Familiar” and “A Patterning of Fire, a Gathering of Ash”), DASH Literary Journal (“Dithyramb with Streetlight”), Fireweed: Poetry of Western Oregon (“Washing in the Sangam”), Fourteen Hills (“Controlled Burn” and “Passing Paradise”), Hayden’s Ferry Review (“Blue Spark”), Linebreak (“Heaven As Nothing but Distance”), Mid-American Review (“Against Forgiveness”), New South (“Field Rows”and “Field Guide to the Second Coming”), Sonora Review (“Sparrow” and “A Soul Petitions Entry”), Southern Indiana Review (“Of the Father”), Southern Poetry Review (“A Question of Ear”), Still (“LessThan Ash” and “Swing Low”), Third Coast (“Collateral”), Tusculum Review (“Attrition”), and Waccamaw (“Theodicy”). “Field Guide to the Second Coming” appeared in Apocalypse Now: Poems and Prose from the End of Days, edited by Andrew McFadyen-Ketchum and Alexander Lumans. “Controlled Burn” appeared in Best New Poets , edited by Kim Addonizio. “Sparrow”appeared in The Southern PoetryAnthologyVolumeVI:Tennessee, edited by Jesse Graves, Paul Ruffin, andWilliamWright. “Praise Nothing” appeared on the website Verse Daily. “There Is a Fountain” appeared in Writing By Ear: An Anthology of Writings About Music, edited by MarianneWorthington. Thanks to Larry Malley and everyone at the University of Arkansas Press. Thanks to Enid Shomer for her thoughtful readership and guidance. Thanks to the institutions that provided me with support and employment during the years when these poems were written and revised: v the University of Oregon, Chemeketa Community College, and the University of Tennessee. Thanks to Kim Addonizio,William Archila, Lory Bedikian, Marilyn Kallet, Laurie Lamon,T. R. Hummer, Larissa Szporluk, PimoneTriplett, SusanWood, RobertWrigley, Jake AdamYork, and Paul Zimmer. Many thanks to Dorianne Laux and Joseph Millar. Many thanks to Garrett Hongo and Arthur Smith. Special thanks to Jeffrey Schultz. I could not have written these poems without the love, sacrifice, and patience of my wife, Emily.This book is for her. vi ...