Poetry Spotlight: Contributor Jill McDonough

Memorious contributor Jill McDonough’s latest poetry collection, Reaper, takes war poetry to new places: computer screens far removed from the action. With elegant, conversational free verse and surprising, deft villanelles, McDonough ruminates on drone warfare, one of America’s more controversial war tactics. In chatty meditations on drones’ names, McDonough reveals what their makers might have…

Memorious Speaks: Jennifer Tseng Reads “I never read one word Toni Morrison wrote.”

Welcome to “Memorious Speaks,” a new corner of the blog, which features authors performing poetry and prose published in Memorious. In this edition, Jennifer Tseng reads “I never read one word Toni Morrison wrote.,” her stunning poem from Memorious 27. Read the full text of “I never read one word Toni Morrison wrote.” here.   For original poetry,…

Poetry Spotlight: Contributor Lloyd Schwartz

Acclaimed poet Lloyd Schwartz’s long-awaited fourth full collection of poems, Little Kisses, has recently been released by the University of Chicago Press. From the opening title poem, he again proves himself to be, as the New York Times has praised him, “the master of the poetic one-liner.” The journey of Little Kisses is a constant…

Memorious Speaks: Nicky Beer Reads “Cathy Dies”

Welcome to “Memorious Speaks,” a new corner of the blog, which features authors performing poetry and prose published in Memorious. First up, Nikky Beer reads “Cathy Dies,” her stunning poem from Memorious 27. Read the full text of “Cathy Dies” here.   For original poetry, fiction, art song and art, please visit our magazine at www.memorious.org.

Poetry Spotlight: Contributor Derrick Harriell

Derrick Harriell’s third collection of poetry, Stripper in Wonderland, dances. Recently released from LSU Press, Harriell’s collection explores music, religion, and racism while continuously twirling readers through past, present, and future spaces. Influenced by Funk and Funk culture, his poems grip us with their musicality, an undercurrent that keeps us hungry for the next moment,…

Poetry Spotlight: Contributor Michael Bazzett

Within the poems of Michael Bazzett’s new collection, Our Lands Are Not So Different (Horsethief), you may find yourself in conversation with a man who “specialized in enslaving the wind” or watching a bison leap a fence. You might observe a woman slipping into another woman’s life—“an older version of herself”—as she tries on a…

Poetry Spotlight: Contributor Leslie Harrison

Leslie Harrison’s second poetry collection, The Book of Endings, part of the Akron Series in Poetry, takes place in a space between the real world (where it’s usually winter), the imagination, language, art, and myth. The poems seem always to be trying to get to the bottom of things, and one of the pleasures of…

(Non-)Fiction Spotlight: Contributor Peter Orner

Peter Orner is the author of several books, including the novels The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo (Little, Brown) and Love and Shame and Love (Little, Brown), and the short story collections Esther Stories (Back Bay) and Last Car Over the Sagamore Bridge (Back Bay). He has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Lannan Foundation Literary…

Poetry Spotlight: Contributor Jacques J. Rancourt

Jacques J. Rancourt is an Issue 26 contributor and winner of the Pleiades Lena-Miles Wever Todd Prize for Poetry. His debut collection, Novena, is a coming-of-age and a coming out. Wresting a fractured identity from the past and making of it a gift for the beloved—and for the reader—Novena seeks redemption, wholeness. Strapped to the “[c]lutched mast” of his ship, Rancourt’s Odysseus…

Poetry Spotlight: Contributor Matthew Thorburn

Matthew Thorburn’s fourth full-length collection, Dear Almost, has recently been released by Louisiana State University Press. A book-length poem broken into sections that correspond to the four seasons, it is also a love letter addressed to a daughter lost to miscarriage. The poem is vividly, beautifully awake to the world, which has been reconfigured by…