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{ "item_title" : "Scratching the Ghost", "item_author" : [" Dexter L. Booth "], "item_description" : "Winner of the Cave Canem Poetry Prize, selected by Major JacksonThe stub of your left leg danglesas I hold you up, my hands inserted under your armslike a child. You are complaining about the itch, the burn; scratch the ghost of your calf and heel. --from Scratching the GhostDexter L. Booth's ruminations on loss in this award-winning debut are rooted in a time past but one still palpable and persistent. Here are memories of love lost, family mourned, a father absent, ghosts of hometowns and childhood. Here too is a Short Letter to the Twentieth Century and, finally, a Long Letter to the Twentieth Century, as if across this collection the poet is mustering up the force to speak back to history.In Dexter Booth's Scratching the Ghost, a cracked egg means the universe is splitting, the slap of a double-dutch rope is a broken-throated hymn, and splitting a squealing hog is akin to lovemaking. These are poems loyal to their own intrepid logic and reckless plausibility. Yet, lest the reader get too giddy in a fun house of mirrors, here, too, are the melodic laments and remarkable lyric passages of a poet who acknowledges the infinite current of melancholy that underlines his journey. --Major Jackson", "item_img_path" : "https://covers3.booksamillion.com/covers/bam/1/55/597/660/1555976603_b.jpg", "price_data" : { "retail_price" : "15.00", "online_price" : "15.00", "our_price" : "15.00", "club_price" : "15.00", "savings_pct" : "0", "savings_amt" : "0.00", "club_savings_pct" : "0", "club_savings_amt" : "0.00", "discount_pct" : "10", "store_price" : "" } }
Scratching the Ghost|Dexter L. Booth

Scratching the Ghost

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Overview

Winner of the Cave Canem Poetry Prize, selected by Major Jackson

The stub of your left leg dangles
as I hold you up, my hands inserted under your arms
like a child. You are complaining about the itch,
the burn; scratch the ghost of your calf and heel.
--from "Scratching the Ghost"

Dexter L. Booth's ruminations on loss in this award-winning debut are rooted in a time past but one still palpable and persistent. Here are memories of love lost, family mourned, a father absent, ghosts of hometowns and childhood. Here too is a "Short Letter to the Twentieth Century" and, finally, a "Long Letter to the Twentieth Century," as if across this collection the poet is mustering up the force to speak back to history.

"In Dexter Booth's Scratching the Ghost, a cracked egg means the universe is splitting, the slap of a double-dutch rope is a broken-throated hymn, and splitting a squealing hog is akin to lovemaking. These are poems loyal to their own intrepid logic and reckless plausibility. Yet, lest the reader get too giddy in a fun house of mirrors, here, too, are the melodic laments and remarkable lyric passages of a poet who acknowledges the infinite current of melancholy that underlines his journey." --Major Jackson

Details

  • ISBN-13: 9781555976606
  • ISBN-10: 1555976603
  • Publisher: Graywolf Press
  • Publish Date: November 2013
  • Dimensions: 9.05 x 6.01 x 0.29 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 0.34 pounds
  • Page Count: 88

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