In this Book
- Showtime at the Ministry of Lost Causes
- Book
- 2016
- Published by: University of Pittsburgh Press
- Series: Pitt Poetry Series
summary
The poems in Showtime at the Ministry of Lost Causes are survival songs, the tunes you whistle while walking through the Valley of Shadows, to keep your fears at bay and your spirit awake. The shadows here are many—cancer, poverty, a lost love, famine, suicide, war, an ever-encroaching existential angst. But so are the saving graces—a drag queen waitress whose “painted-on eyebrows arched like a bridge / toward starlight,” “strawberries / grown fat around dimpled gold seeds,” Pink Floyd’s “‘On the Turning Away’ sent through my car / radio like the ghost voice of a beloved long dead,” black phoebes rattling “winter / thistles, swollen throats percussing: / this is this is this is . . . ” Showtime at the Ministry of Lost Causes reminds us that where there is shadow there must, necessarily, also be light.
Table of Contents
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- I. Good Morning Heartache
- Revolution
- p. 5
- Ode to October
- pp. 11-12
- II. At the Reunion of Lost Memories
- Tampons: A Memoir
- pp. 15-18
- Conception Myth
- p. 19
- At the Reunion of Lost Memories
- pp. 22-23
- When she finally lost the weight
- pp. 24-25
- Ode to Pink Floyd
- pp. 26-27
- Breaking the Broken Things
- pp. 28-30
- III. The Heart Has Four Chambers
- The Heart Has Four Chambers
- pp. 33-34
- A Thousand Words for Goodbye
- pp. 35-39
- Fever Dream
- p. 41
- Coming Home
- p. 43
- Prayer for Beginning
- p. 44
- IV. That I Could Keep You Like This
- That I Could Keep You Like This
- pp. 54-55
- A Million Silver Minnows
- pp. 56-58
- Halfway Up Devil Mountain
- pp. 59-60
- V. The Acrobats of Pittsburgh
- The Acrobats of Pittsburgh
- pp. 63-67
- Vocabulary
- p. 72
- The Problem Is
- p. 74
- How to Slice Bananas
- p. 76
- His Currency
- p. 77
- The Words Are
- pp. 80-83
- Lake Dharma
- pp. 84-86
- Acknowledgments
- pp. 89-90
Additional Information
ISBN
9780822982005
Related ISBN(s)
9780822964315
MARC Record
OCLC
961116333
Pages
102
Launched on MUSE
2016-12-06
Language
English
Open Access
No
Copyright
2016