Keynote
“Tracy K. Smith’s poetry is an awakening itself.” (Vogue)
Book Title
Such Color
Subtitle
New and Selected Poems
Cover Image
“[Tracy K. Smith is] a poet of formal breadth and consistent excellence. . . . This collection is a commanding reminder that the former poet laureate is one of the most important poets writing today.”—Emilia Phillips, The New York Times Book Review
Poem Excerpt
Is the world intended for me? Not just me but
The we that fills me? Our shadows reel and dart.
Our blood simmers, stirred back. What if
The world has never had—will never have—our backs?
The world has never had—will never have—our backs.
Our blood simmers, stirred back. What if
The we that fills me, our shadows real and dark,
Is the world intended for me?
—from “I Sit Outside in Low Late-Afternoon Light to Feel Earth Call to Me”
The we that fills me? Our shadows reel and dart.
Our blood simmers, stirred back. What if
The world has never had—will never have—our backs?
The world has never had—will never have—our backs.
Our blood simmers, stirred back. What if
The we that fills me, our shadows real and dark,
Is the world intended for me?
—from “I Sit Outside in Low Late-Afternoon Light to Feel Earth Call to Me”
Body
Celebrated for its extraordinary intelligence and exhilarating range, the poetry of Tracy K. Smith opens up vast questions. Such Color: New and Selected Poems, her first career-spanning volume, traces an increasingly audacious commitment to exploring the unknowable, the immense mysteries of existence. Each of Smith’s four collections moves farther outward: when one seems to reach the limits of desire and the body, the next investigates the very sweep of history; when one encounters death and the outer reaches of space, the next bears witness to violence against language and people from across time and delves into the rescuing possibilities of the everlasting. Smith’s signature voice, whether in elegy or praise or outrage, insists upon vibrancy and hope, even—and especially—in moments of inconceivable travesty and grief.
Such Color collects the best poems from Smith’s award-winning books and culminates in thirty pages of brilliant, excoriating new poems. These new works confront America’s historical and contemporary racism and injustices, while they also rise toward the registers of the ecstatic, the rapturous, and the sacred—urging us toward love as a resistance to everything that impedes it. This magnificent retrospective affirms Smith’s place as one of the twenty-first century’s most treasured poets.
Such Color collects the best poems from Smith’s award-winning books and culminates in thirty pages of brilliant, excoriating new poems. These new works confront America’s historical and contemporary racism and injustices, while they also rise toward the registers of the ecstatic, the rapturous, and the sacred—urging us toward love as a resistance to everything that impedes it. This magnificent retrospective affirms Smith’s place as one of the twenty-first century’s most treasured poets.
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About the Author
Praise
- “Haunting and vital, [Such Color is] the perfect encapsulation of a remarkable body of work.”—TIME
- “The collected poems reflect the bright arc of Smith's career. . . . [Her] admirers will enjoy revisiting favorite poems and reading new works, while this volume will stand as a welcoming and dazzling introduction to Smith's poetry for first-timers.”—Booklist, starred review
- “Both timeless and urgent, [Such Color] serves as a humbling and invigorating reawakening from sorrow and apathy.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
- “Moving from dark to light, grief into joy, these contrasts form the graceful swiveling energy of Smith’s verse, which is on full display in Such Color. . . . You don’t read a Smith poem; you fall into it, surrendering, like an embrace, as in the best poems of Lucille Clifton.”—John Freeman, Alta Journal
