Honored by Library Journal as an “Amazing Poetry Title”
“Extraordinary how in a single poem from 2013 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award winner Boruch slides 1800s London barber-surgeons and the dissection of murderers only (condemned to hell anyway) to the observation, ‘Future or past, it’s all we ever think about.’ The first part of this sharp, surprising book captures our inescapable but slippery physicality in the world, the second the breakdown of the cadaver of a 99-year-old woman—told from her perspective, rather jauntily.”—Library Journal
“Boruch displays a quietly gymnastic intellect in the examinations of art, the body, and the human condition.”—American Poets
“Marianne Boruch's work has the wonderful, commanding power of true attention: she sees and considers with intensity.”—The Washington Post
“Some books begin as a dare to the self,” notes poet Marianne Boruch. Inspired by life-study drawing classes and direct work in a cadaver lab, Boruch's latest book looks at what the body holds, and examines living through bodies deceased.
Marianne Boruch is the author of seven collections of poetry including The Book of Hours (Copper Canyon Press), two volumes of essays, and a memoir. In 2013 she won the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. She lives in West Lafayette, Indiana.
