num_pages: 160
description: With his signature wit and insight, award-winning poet Stephen Dobyns probes the secrets of the heartConsider the mysteries of the heart, that blood-pumping organ and, in Stephen Dobyns' latest collection of poems, the hapless romantic of our interior landscape. "The Himalayas Within Him" finds Heart worrying about the sound of his own heartbeat, wondering why it doesn't "blare like a quartet of trombones" as it reflects his "ardent complexity." In "Goodbye to the Hands That Have Touched Him" Heart, after suffering many sleepless nights, decides "that love exists at the root of his problems. Without love his path would be as smooth as a plate of glass and he'd sleep like a kitten." Dividing the Heart poems is the long "Oh, Immobility, Death's Vast Associate," a jazzy disquisition on human isolation and inaction in the midst of a planet full of people feeling similarly. Throughout Pallbearers Envying the One Who Rides Dobyns has painstakingly sculpted straightforward language into a distinct sound, creating an unforgettable collection of poems that offers readers unexpected revelations about the complexities of the heart.. . . Why is Heart alone in the chest?Because hope is an aspect of the single conditionand without hope, why move our feet? To see himselfas purely a such is Heart's obligation.Let's quickly depart before we learn what happens.Sometimes a car stops. Sometimes there is nothing.--from "Like a Revolving Door"
language: English
title: Pallbearers Envying the One Who Rides
titlecomplete: Pallbearers Envying the One Who Rides (Poets, Penguin)
genres: Poetry
ratings_count: 105
publisher: Penguin Books