Said Not Said
Poems
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ISBN10: 1555977731
ISBN13: 9781555977733
Paperback
96 Pages
$16.00
CA$22.99
someone in Benghazi with a hose in one hand
uses his free one to wipe down the corpse
water flows over the body and down
a tilted steel tray toward the drain
what washes off washes off
—“Below the Fold”
In this formally inventive new poetry collection, Fred Marchant brings us into realms of the intractable and the unacceptable, those places where words seem to fail us and yet are all we have. In the process, he affirms lyric poetry’s central role in the contemporary moral imagination. As the National Book Award winner David Ferry writes, “The poems in this beautiful new book by Fred Marchant are autobiographical, but, as is always the case with his poems, autobiographical of how he has witnessed, with faithfully exact and pitying observation, the sufferings in the lives of other people, for example the heartbreaking series of poems about the fatal mental suffering of his sister, and the poems about other peoples, in Vietnam, in the Middle East, written about with the noble generosity of feeling that has always characterized his work, here more impressively even than before.”
Said Not Said is a poet’s taking stock of conscience, his country’s and his own, and of poetry’s capacity to speak to what matters most.
Reviews
Praise for Said Not Said
“Fred Marchant demonstrates how poetry provides a crucial outlet—and perhaps some catharsis—in response to the inequities or cruelties of life . . . The inventiveness of his writing—which makes use of various forms and some brilliant wordplay—contributes to its power. So does Marchant’s honesty as he travels great distances, geographically and psychologically, seeking to understand the human soul.”—The Washington Post
“Marchant’s wisdom is impeccably welded to his sense of how words should sound when connecting thought to experience, and how the contemporary and the ancient are inseparable . . . [Said Not Said] is an eloquent engagement with a history we will always need to understand better, as we make collective effort to bend toward justice. Fred Marchant is a blessed, vital part of that task.”—The Rumpus
“Marchant displays an unflinching tenderness in a collection of sonically and architecturally precise poems . . . [A] beautiful, elegiac collection.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“[A] sublime and subtle collection . . . Similar in approach to Larry Levis and David St. John, Marchant is at his finest when he blends everyday reflection and curious erudition, both of which he delivers in equal measure.”—Booklist