{"product_id":"second-empire","title":"Second Empire","description":"\u003cp\u003e\"The delicate arc of these poems intimates--rather than tells--a love story: celebration, fear of loss, storm, abandonment, an opening forth. Richie Hofmann disciplines his natural elegance into the sterner recognitions that matter: 'I am a little white omnivore,' the speaker of \u003ci\u003eSecond Empire\u003c\/i\u003e discovers. Mastering directness and indirection, Hofmann's poems break through their own beauty.\"--Rosanna Warren\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThis debut's spare, delicate poems explore ways we experience the afterlife of beauty while ornately examining lust, loss, and identity. Drawing upon traditions of amorous sonnets, these love-elegies desire an artistic and sexual connection to others--other times, other places--in order to understand aesthetic pleasures the speaker craves. Distant and formal, the poems feel both ancient and contemporary.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eAntique Book\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe sky was crazed with swallows.\u003cbr\u003e We walked in the frozen grass\u003cbr\u003e of your new city, I was gauzed with sleep.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eTrees shook down their gaudy nests.\u003cbr\u003e The ceramic pots were caparisoned with snow.\u003cbr\u003e I was jealous of the river,\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003ehow the light broke it, of the skein\u003cbr\u003e of windows where we saw ourselves.\u003cbr\u003e Where we walked, the ice cracked\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003elike an antique book, opening\u003cbr\u003e and closing. The leaves\u003cbr\u003e beneath it were the marbled pages.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eRichie Hofmann\u003c\/b\u003e is the winner of a Ruth Lilly Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and his poems have appeared or are forthcoming in the \u003ci\u003eNew Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003ePoetry\u003c\/i\u003e, the \u003ci\u003eKenyon Review\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003ePloughshares\u003c\/i\u003e. A graduate of the Johns Hopkins University MFA program, he is currently a Creative Writing Fellow in Poetry at Emory University.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"sb-details\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePublished:\u003c\/strong\u003e 2015\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 69\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/strong\u003e Alice James Books\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eISBN:\u003c\/strong\u003e 9781938584169\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Alice James Books","offers":[{"title":"Standard Secondhand — £754.80","offer_id":47919245557937,"sku":"SB-1938584163-C3","price":754.8,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0618\/2669\/5345\/files\/1938584163.jpg?v=1789716292","url":"https:\/\/sellbooks.co.uk\/products\/second-empire","provider":"Sell Books .co.uk","version":"1.0","type":"link"}