The eagerly awaited, brilliant, and engaging new poems by Tony Hoagland, author of What Narcissism Means to Me
Application for Release from the Dream
Poems
- “Tony Hoagland’s best work yet. . . . No matter the subject, Hoagland’s narratives are smooth, inviting and so insightful that he seems to anticipate how readers will think and feel.”—The Washington Post
The parade for the slain police officer
goes past the bakery
and the smell of fresh bread
makes the mourners salivate against their will.
—from “Note to Reality”
goes past the bakery
and the smell of fresh bread
makes the mourners salivate against their will.
—from “Note to Reality”
Are we corrupt or innocent, fragmented or whole? Are responsibility and freedom irreconcilable? Do we value memory or succumb to our forgetfulness? Application for Release from the Dream, Tony Hoagland’s fifth collection of poems, pursues these questions with the hobnailed abandon of one who needs to know how a citizen of twenty-first-century America can stay human. With whiplash nerve and tender curiosity, Hoagland both surveys the damage and finds the wonder that makes living worthwhile. Mirthful, fearless, and precise, these poems are full of judgment and mercy.
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About the Author
Credit: Elizabeth Jacobson
Praise
- Named a Best Poetry Collection of 2015 by The Washington Post and BuzzFeed
- “John Updike once said that ‘[e]xcellence in the great things is built upon excellence in the small.’ Tony Hoagland’s latest collection, Application for Release from the Dream, is a first-rate case in point.”—The Rumpus
- “Hoagland is diligent, inquisitive, compelling, and barn-burning in these revelatory and necessary poems.”—Booklist
- “Full of poems like a rush of fresh air. . . . Enjoy Hoagland’s well-crafted evocative thoughts and humor.”—Shelf Awareness for Readers, starred review
