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Ordinary Beast: Poems — A Striking Debut Poetry Collection
A striking, full-length debut collection from Virgin Islands-born poet Nicole Sealey
The existential magnitude, deep intellect, and playful subversion of St. Thomas-born, Florida-raised poet Nicole Sealey’s work is restless in its empathic, succinct examination and lucid awareness of what it means to be human.
The ranging scope of inquiry undertaken in Ordinary Beast—at times philosophical, emotional, and experiential—is evident in each thrilling twist of image by the poet. In brilliant, often ironic lines that move from meditation to matter of fact in a single beat, Sealey’s voice is always awake to the natural world, to the pain and punishment of existence, to the origins and demises of humanity. Exploring notions of race, sexuality, gender, myth, history, and embodiment with profound understanding, Sealey’s is a poetry that refuses to turn a blind eye or deny. It is a poetry of daunting knowledge.
The existential magnitude, deep intellect, and playful subversion of St. Thomas-born, Florida-raised poet Nicole Sealey’s work is restless in its empathic, succinct examination and lucid awareness of what it means to be human.
The ranging scope of inquiry undertaken in Ordinary Beast—at times philosophical, emotional, and experiential—is evident in each thrilling twist of image by the poet. In brilliant, often ironic lines that move from meditation to matter of fact in a single beat, Sealey’s voice is always awake to the natural world, to the pain and punishment of existence, to the origins and demises of humanity. Exploring notions of race, sexuality, gender, myth, history, and embodiment with profound understanding, Sealey’s is a poetry that refuses to turn a blind eye or deny. It is a poetry of daunting knowledge.
96 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 12, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 192 reviews
February 7, 2018
3.5 stars.
Though we're not so self-
important as to think everything
has led to this, everything has led to this.
There's a name for the animal
love makes of us—named, I think,
like rain, for the sound it makes.
Continuing my foray into contemporary poetry, I recently picked up Ordinary Beast , a new collection of poems by Nicole Sealey. The book was named one of NPR's most anticipated poetry books of 2017, and reading Sealey's work, you certainly can understand why.
This is a fascinating collection, at times dazzling, at times perplexing, but continuously powerful and emotional. Sealey writes with a burning passion about love, sex, race, history, and legacy, using words that immediately conjure vivid images. Interestingly enough, while some poems appear and read more like "traditional" poems, some appear and read more like prose, but they're no less effective.
I love you, I say, desperate
to admit that
the flesh extends its vanity
to an unknown land
where all the wild swarm.
This is not death. It is something safer,
almost made of air—
I think they call it god.
The collection contains 26 poems, many of which are quite short, some of which use an experimental style of layout, which made it difficult to gauge the poem's full meaning. Since I'm close to being a poetry neophyte, I tended to enjoy those poems which were a little more traditional, the ones whose meaning seemed more evident. But even in those poems which didn't quite work for me, Sealey's talent was immensely evident, line after powerful line.
We fit somewhere between god
and mineral, angel and animal,
believing a thing as sacred as the sun rises
and falls like an ordinary beast.
I've really been enjoying this exploration of contemporary poetry. I'm learning that, just like the world of fiction, the depth of talent out there today is immense, and I'm also beginning to understand the type of works which appeal to me. Nicole Sealey is clearly an artist in this genre, and I'd encourage those of you who enjoy a mix of styles in your poetry to pick up this collection.
See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com, or check out my list of the best books I read in 2017 at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2018/01/the-best-books-i-read-in-2017.html.
Though we're not so self-
important as to think everything
has led to this, everything has led to this.
There's a name for the animal
love makes of us—named, I think,
like rain, for the sound it makes.
Continuing my foray into contemporary poetry, I recently picked up Ordinary Beast , a new collection of poems by Nicole Sealey. The book was named one of NPR's most anticipated poetry books of 2017, and reading Sealey's work, you certainly can understand why.
This is a fascinating collection, at times dazzling, at times perplexing, but continuously powerful and emotional. Sealey writes with a burning passion about love, sex, race, history, and legacy, using words that immediately conjure vivid images. Interestingly enough, while some poems appear and read more like "traditional" poems, some appear and read more like prose, but they're no less effective.
I love you, I say, desperate
to admit that
the flesh extends its vanity
to an unknown land
where all the wild swarm.
This is not death. It is something safer,
almost made of air—
I think they call it god.
The collection contains 26 poems, many of which are quite short, some of which use an experimental style of layout, which made it difficult to gauge the poem's full meaning. Since I'm close to being a poetry neophyte, I tended to enjoy those poems which were a little more traditional, the ones whose meaning seemed more evident. But even in those poems which didn't quite work for me, Sealey's talent was immensely evident, line after powerful line.
We fit somewhere between god
and mineral, angel and animal,
believing a thing as sacred as the sun rises
and falls like an ordinary beast.
I've really been enjoying this exploration of contemporary poetry. I'm learning that, just like the world of fiction, the depth of talent out there today is immense, and I'm also beginning to understand the type of works which appeal to me. Nicole Sealey is clearly an artist in this genre, and I'd encourage those of you who enjoy a mix of styles in your poetry to pick up this collection.
See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com, or check out my list of the best books I read in 2017 at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2018/01/the-best-books-i-read-in-2017.html.
August 27, 2017
I requested a review copy of this from Edelweiss before I saw it on NPR's Poetry to Pay Attention To in 2017 list, but they weren't wrong.
Nicole Sealy has the ability to embody the pain of others, and empathy and shared anger or sadness fill many of these poems. A great example is Virginia is for Lovers , about the "house in Virginia."
I also resonated with "a violence," about the lack of maternal drive among other things (read and listen on The New Yorker); and felt the emotions behind "hysterical strength," about how much strength people of color, specifically black people, must have just to exist.
From the wordplay perspective, I also really loved "and" with all the words that have "and" inside of them.
Thanks to the publisher through Edelweiss. This comes out in September!
Nicole Sealy has the ability to embody the pain of others, and empathy and shared anger or sadness fill many of these poems. A great example is Virginia is for Lovers , about the "house in Virginia."
I also resonated with "a violence," about the lack of maternal drive among other things (read and listen on The New Yorker); and felt the emotions behind "hysterical strength," about how much strength people of color, specifically black people, must have just to exist.
From the wordplay perspective, I also really loved "and" with all the words that have "and" inside of them.
Thanks to the publisher through Edelweiss. This comes out in September!
April 24, 2018
Wow! Just Wow! This collection has left me blown away. She is brilliant with words. Go check Nicole Sealy out on LIT YouTube channel where she was interviewed by Yahdon. Wonderful!
August 30, 2021
I like how some of these poems are "light" and "young" despite their often heavy topics (does it get any heavier than race in America, where all people are created equal asterisk on paper slash in Thomas Jefferson's racy -- just ask Sally -- mind?). Read this one, for example:
it's not fitness, it's a lifestyle
I'm waiting for a white woman
in this overpriced Equinox
to mistake me for someone other
than a paying member. I can see it now--
as I leave the steam room
(naked but for my wedding ring?)
she'll ask whether I've finished
cleaning it. Every time
I'm at an airport I see a bird
flying around inside, so fast I can't
make out its wings. I ask myself
what is it doing here? I've come
to answer: what is any of us?
Not particularly poetic... and the speaker is "waiting for" something to happen vs. experiencing it, but it leads to a neat little reverse lay-up of Maya Angelou's "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." Only in an airport. With a question any philosophical sort could cherish.
The only bump in the road would be a poem called "Clue" which featured all the characters in the board game. Like the game itself, a bit of a grind. The type of poem that, in hindsight and given a number of years, might be considered a regret by the author. Or not. (What do I know -- other than that exact feeling when it comes to poems and past books?)
Sealey also features a form called an "Obverse" supposedly dreamed up by a Thomas Hirschhorn in 2006. You write a stanza or two, then play mirror, mirror on the page by writing another stanza or two that's simply the same lines in reverse order. Attached to the end? A thesis question. Interesting. And a great way to double your poem's size if you tend to write brief poems!
it's not fitness, it's a lifestyle
I'm waiting for a white woman
in this overpriced Equinox
to mistake me for someone other
than a paying member. I can see it now--
as I leave the steam room
(naked but for my wedding ring?)
she'll ask whether I've finished
cleaning it. Every time
I'm at an airport I see a bird
flying around inside, so fast I can't
make out its wings. I ask myself
what is it doing here? I've come
to answer: what is any of us?
Not particularly poetic... and the speaker is "waiting for" something to happen vs. experiencing it, but it leads to a neat little reverse lay-up of Maya Angelou's "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." Only in an airport. With a question any philosophical sort could cherish.
The only bump in the road would be a poem called "Clue" which featured all the characters in the board game. Like the game itself, a bit of a grind. The type of poem that, in hindsight and given a number of years, might be considered a regret by the author. Or not. (What do I know -- other than that exact feeling when it comes to poems and past books?)
Sealey also features a form called an "Obverse" supposedly dreamed up by a Thomas Hirschhorn in 2006. You write a stanza or two, then play mirror, mirror on the page by writing another stanza or two that's simply the same lines in reverse order. Attached to the end? A thesis question. Interesting. And a great way to double your poem's size if you tend to write brief poems!
December 2, 2017
medical history
I’ve been pregnant. I’ve had sex with a man
who’s had sex with men. I can’t sleep.
My mother has, my mother’s mother had,
asthma. My father had a stroke. My father’s
mother has high blood pressure.
Both grandfathers died from diabetes.
I drink. I don’t smoke. Xanax for flying.
Propranolol for anxiety. My eyes are bad.
I’m spooked by wind. Cousin Lilly died
from an aneurysm. Aunt Hilda, a heart attack.
Uncle Ken, wise as he was, was hit
by a car as if to disprove whatever theory
toward which I write. And, I understand,
the stars in the sky are already dead.
a violence
You hear the high-pitched yowls of strays
fighting for scraps tossed from a kitchen window.
They sound like children you might have had.
Had you wanted children. Had you a maternal bone,
you would wrench it from your belly and fling it
from your fire escape. As if it were the stubborn
shard now lodged in your wrist. No, you would hide it.
Yes, you would hide it inside a barren nesting doll
you’ve had since you were a child. Its smile
reminds you of your father, who does not smile.
Nor does he believe you are his. “You look just like
your mother,” he says, “who looks just like a fire
of suspicious origin.” A body, I’ve read, can sustain
its own sick burning, its own hell, for hours.
It’s the mind. It’s the mind that cannot.
it’s not fitness, it’s a lifestyle
I’m waiting for a white woman
in this overpriced Equinox
to mistake me for someone other
than a paying member. I can see it now—
as I leave the steam room
(naked but for my wedding ring?)
she’ll ask whether I’ve finished
cleaning it. Every time
I’m at an airport I see a bird
flying around inside, so fast I can’t
make out its wings. I ask myself
what is it doing here? I’ve come
to answer: what is any of us?
I’ve been pregnant. I’ve had sex with a man
who’s had sex with men. I can’t sleep.
My mother has, my mother’s mother had,
asthma. My father had a stroke. My father’s
mother has high blood pressure.
Both grandfathers died from diabetes.
I drink. I don’t smoke. Xanax for flying.
Propranolol for anxiety. My eyes are bad.
I’m spooked by wind. Cousin Lilly died
from an aneurysm. Aunt Hilda, a heart attack.
Uncle Ken, wise as he was, was hit
by a car as if to disprove whatever theory
toward which I write. And, I understand,
the stars in the sky are already dead.
a violence
You hear the high-pitched yowls of strays
fighting for scraps tossed from a kitchen window.
They sound like children you might have had.
Had you wanted children. Had you a maternal bone,
you would wrench it from your belly and fling it
from your fire escape. As if it were the stubborn
shard now lodged in your wrist. No, you would hide it.
Yes, you would hide it inside a barren nesting doll
you’ve had since you were a child. Its smile
reminds you of your father, who does not smile.
Nor does he believe you are his. “You look just like
your mother,” he says, “who looks just like a fire
of suspicious origin.” A body, I’ve read, can sustain
its own sick burning, its own hell, for hours.
It’s the mind. It’s the mind that cannot.
it’s not fitness, it’s a lifestyle
I’m waiting for a white woman
in this overpriced Equinox
to mistake me for someone other
than a paying member. I can see it now—
as I leave the steam room
(naked but for my wedding ring?)
she’ll ask whether I’ve finished
cleaning it. Every time
I’m at an airport I see a bird
flying around inside, so fast I can’t
make out its wings. I ask myself
what is it doing here? I’ve come
to answer: what is any of us?
Read
March 7, 2018The perils of expectations.
I'm not going to rate this book for the simple reason that I went into it with assumptions that turned out to be erroneous. I thought this was a book written by an author from the US Virgin Islands, and I was excited--thrilled. Born, not raised in the islands; they were reared stateside. Huge difference.
So, the hope of poems of about the islands were never realized. There's no kenips, sugar apples, tamarinds, nor mangoes. No mocko jumbies nor carnival. No blinding mirrors skipping across the sea waves. No shards of pottery littered among the pebbles. No mongoose, and no sea turtles. No goat roti, guava tarts, nor rum. No sugar mill ruins. There was no island life. I leapt into this with the hope of seeing something I would recognize from childhood, but it wasn't there.
Simply, I was wrong to think it would. Thus, no rating.
I'm not going to rate this book for the simple reason that I went into it with assumptions that turned out to be erroneous. I thought this was a book written by an author from the US Virgin Islands, and I was excited--thrilled. Born, not raised in the islands; they were reared stateside. Huge difference.
So, the hope of poems of about the islands were never realized. There's no kenips, sugar apples, tamarinds, nor mangoes. No mocko jumbies nor carnival. No blinding mirrors skipping across the sea waves. No shards of pottery littered among the pebbles. No mongoose, and no sea turtles. No goat roti, guava tarts, nor rum. No sugar mill ruins. There was no island life. I leapt into this with the hope of seeing something I would recognize from childhood, but it wasn't there.
Simply, I was wrong to think it would. Thus, no rating.
We fit somewhere between god
and mineral, angel and animal
believing a thing as sacred as the sun rises
and falls like an ordinary beast.
September 15, 2017
This book of poems is divided into three sections. I was worried at first that it wasn't going to live up to the hype, but spending more time with it, and particularly the third section, convinced me that it does. Exploring race in America, myth, love and death with both beauty and stark reality.
December 12, 2018
I lost my copy of this book while I was reading it so I had a long time to let these poems sit in me, somewhat incomplete but growing. It seemed to increase their intensity when I finally got another copy of the book.
These are powerful, angry, grieving, passionate poems. Soon I will read them again.
These are powerful, angry, grieving, passionate poems. Soon I will read them again.
December 2, 2017
”O, / how I’ll miss you when we’re dead." -Nicole Sealey, from “Object Permanence"
Though her poetry previously appeared in The New Yorker and New York Times and her chapbook The Animal After Whom Other Animals Are Named was published in 2015, Ordinary Beast (2017) is Nicole Sealey’s first full-length poetry collection. I was fortunate enough to read with Sealey at a Village Voice poetry reading in 2015, but I never really sat with her poetry for a long time until I read this book. One of the most salient characteristics of these clear, compact poems is their urgency, their sense of ever-present danger, of the precariousness of life and the transience of fortune: in particular, in poems like “Candelabra With Heads” and “Hysterical Strength,” Sealey evokes with stirring urgency the racialized life-and-death perils experienced by Black people in America. Recurring themes include whiteness and hysteria and their meanings.
These serious preoccupations do not preclude the application of great formal playfulness, however. Sealey’s verse is richly laced with witty wordplay, assonance, and rhyme, and the individual poems in this book include humorous pantoums about Clue and Brad Pitt, a traditional sonnet sequence about legendary drag queens, a palindrome poem, a prose poem, a gloss, an erasure, and a cento (and what a terrific cento it is, exploring all the voice-expanding possibilities of the form without sacrificing cohesion or comprehensibility).
”We are dying quickly
but behave as good guests should.”
“I love you, I say, desperate
to admit that
the flesh extends its vanity
to an unknown land
where all the wild swarm.”
“Some say we’re lucky to be alive, to have
a sky that stays there. Above.
And I suppose I would have to agree...
but the hell with that."
“so why am I out here trying
to make men tremble who never weep?"
(quotes from “Cento From the Night I Said ‘I Love You’")
My favorite poem in this book, though, is "A Violence," which deals with themes of especial interest to me in my own work and which can be read in its entirety on the New Yorker website, here: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...
December 13, 2023
the poems in this collection were well constructed, and interesting. and it felt like the author had fun with words and sounds in places 🙂
the poetry didn't seem to engage me much on an emotional level, more an intellectual/mental one... tho that could have just been the day 🙃
the collection might have had a slightly different impact on paper - seeing the layout better, the use of shape, form, longer and shorter pause, pattern... 🤔
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟
accessed as a National Poetry Library audiobook, read by the author, Nicole Sealey 🙂
the poetry didn't seem to engage me much on an emotional level, more an intellectual/mental one... tho that could have just been the day 🙃
the collection might have had a slightly different impact on paper - seeing the layout better, the use of shape, form, longer and shorter pause, pattern... 🤔
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟
accessed as a National Poetry Library audiobook, read by the author, Nicole Sealey 🙂
January 20, 2018
Upon finishing Ordinary Beast, I switched off the lights in my room, lay down in the dark, and let Sealey continue to speak into me.
How rarely have I seen such finessing and engineering of form used to *connect*, in poems, rather than to hold at bay. I prize that.
How rarely have I seen such finessing and engineering of form used to *connect*, in poems, rather than to hold at bay. I prize that.
September 9, 2026
Couldn't get into this one at all. Felt very late-2010s, in an irrelevant way.
October 12, 2024
There are some good poems here. The poet starts strong, with some pointed poems with sharp images. But in the middle and the end, the connection between the poems gets muddled and the purpose of the full collection gets fuzzy. I think this would have been more successful as a chapbook, focused on the first 10 poems and expanding them.
August 25, 2026
Sealey Challenge 2026: 21/31
April 25, 2019
I struggled with a good handful of these poems. Maybe two handfuls. I felt that, too often, clarity was sacrificed for form. There’s a lot of experimental play with language & structure. In theory, I’m all for that. In the practice of reading this collection, I felt my theoretical support waver.
If someone could please explain “c ue” to me, for instance, other than that it‘s “an erasure of “clue“, I'd virtually kiss your feet. Although I usually saw the *technique* of what she was doing (which, admittedly, was impressive), as in “and”, “clue” &, “an apology for trashing magazines in which you appear”, for me, these poems still suffered from a lack of impact. It felt a little bit like misdirection without an appropriate flourish of magic at the end.
I preferred Sealey’s poems that had more of a conversational style, such as: “medical history”, “hysterical strength”, “Virginia is for lovers”, “legendary”, & “in defense of ‘candelabra with heads’”. All of these poems are gut-punching, beautiful, & ugly.
Sealey has powerful things to say about race in America, about life, about death, about health & illness. I just want a chance at beginning to understand her. Maybe criticizing her choice to play (with form or otherwise) isn’t where that understanding starts.
Those who haven’t yet started (or finished!) this collection should know: the notes at the end contain helpful & interesting information! If I’d known that, I would’ve read them alongside the poems (like true endnotes) instead of after. 🤦♀️ I didn’t realize what kind of content they held!
If someone could please explain “c ue” to me, for instance, other than that it‘s “an erasure of “clue“, I'd virtually kiss your feet. Although I usually saw the *technique* of what she was doing (which, admittedly, was impressive), as in “and”, “clue” &, “an apology for trashing magazines in which you appear”, for me, these poems still suffered from a lack of impact. It felt a little bit like misdirection without an appropriate flourish of magic at the end.
I preferred Sealey’s poems that had more of a conversational style, such as: “medical history”, “hysterical strength”, “Virginia is for lovers”, “legendary”, & “in defense of ‘candelabra with heads’”. All of these poems are gut-punching, beautiful, & ugly.
Sealey has powerful things to say about race in America, about life, about death, about health & illness. I just want a chance at beginning to understand her. Maybe criticizing her choice to play (with form or otherwise) isn’t where that understanding starts.
Those who haven’t yet started (or finished!) this collection should know: the notes at the end contain helpful & interesting information! If I’d known that, I would’ve read them alongside the poems (like true endnotes) instead of after. 🤦♀️ I didn’t realize what kind of content they held!
May 13, 2019
Impressed by Sealey's use of form, not as a box or trap that limits but as an instrument with which she does whatever she so desires.
I'm mesmerized by the following poems in this collection:
candlebra with heads
imagine sisyphus happy
in defense of candlebra with heads
virgina is for lovers
cento for the night i said, "i love you"
Also, I plan to read Object Permanence by Nicole Sealey to every human being I may love.
I'm mesmerized by the following poems in this collection:
candlebra with heads
imagine sisyphus happy
in defense of candlebra with heads
virgina is for lovers
cento for the night i said, "i love you"
Also, I plan to read Object Permanence by Nicole Sealey to every human being I may love.
November 1, 2019
A hit-or-miss collection, if I'm honest. There are a few really brilliant poems: "cento for the night i said, 'i love you'," "medical history," and "virginia is for lovers," but too often, as in "an apology for trashing magazines in which you appear," Sealey seems to be more concerned with form, wordplay, and puns than substance. And, unfortunately, none of the poems really live up to the extraordinary "object permanence," the collection's final poem and my reason for buying it.
December 3, 2017
There are many great lines and poems in this, but one jumped out at me that I wish I could steal for myself. "You look just like your mother," he says, "who looks just like a fire of suspicious origin." Goddamn.
October 5, 2019
[March 2025 re-read] My third time around with this collection. Did I start crying during "Imagine Sisyphus Happy"? Yes, yes I did. I think it's become one of my favorite poems.
September 1, 2021
The language in these poems seem simple and straightforward, but they pack a powerful punch. You’ll want to read this collection again.
November 17, 2024
i love poetry rawr
November 12, 2024
I couldn’t stop bruv
March 11, 2024
Some interesting lines, this was pretty good; at times bordering on the hysterical; she keeps it together;
medical history
I’ve been pregnant.
I’ve had sex with a man who’s had sex with men.
I can’t sleep.
My mother has, my mother’s mother had, asthma.
My father had a stroke. My father’s mother has high blood pressure.
Both grandfathers died from diabetes.
I drink. I don’t smoke. Xanax for flying. Propranolol for anxiety.
My eyes are bad. I’m spooked by wind.
Cousin Lilly died from an aneurysm.
Aunt Hilda, a heart attack.
Uncle Ken, wise as he was, was hit by a car as if to disprove whatever theory toward which I write. And, I understand, the stars in the sky are already dead.
medical history
I’ve been pregnant.
I’ve had sex with a man who’s had sex with men.
I can’t sleep.
My mother has, my mother’s mother had, asthma.
My father had a stroke. My father’s mother has high blood pressure.
Both grandfathers died from diabetes.
I drink. I don’t smoke. Xanax for flying. Propranolol for anxiety.
My eyes are bad. I’m spooked by wind.
Cousin Lilly died from an aneurysm.
Aunt Hilda, a heart attack.
Uncle Ken, wise as he was, was hit by a car as if to disprove whatever theory toward which I write. And, I understand, the stars in the sky are already dead.
November 7, 2017
Pros: Gorgeous. really 4.6-4.7ish.
I started reading this book in a sandwich shop near my job and wanted it to be good. I know the author and while I had seen enough of her work to give me confidence that it'd be really good, sometimes you read individual poems you like only to get to the full-length and find all the singles were hot but the rest of the album ain't hittin'. After the first three poems, concluding with "candelabra with heads", the third poem, written in a form the poet calls obverse (an obverse?), I laughed out loud, too loud-and looked around, worried someone had noticed. As for the book, it was quite evident I needn't have worried-Ms. Sealey knows what she's doing.
The book starts w/ "medical history." The two opening and four closing lines:
I’ve been pregnant. I’ve had sex with a man
who’s had sex with men. I can’t sleep.
...
Uncle Ken, wise as he was, was hit
by a car as if to disprove whatever theory
toward which I write. And, I understand,
the stars in the sky are already dead.
One poem in and I'm invested.
A Violence
You hear the high-pitched yowls of strays
fighting for scraps tossed from a kitchen window.
They sound like children you might have had.
Had you wanted children. Had you a maternal bone,
you would wrench it from your belly and fling it
from your fire escape. As if it were the stubborn
shard now lodged in your wrist. No, you would hide it.
Yes, you would hide it inside a barren nesting doll
you’ve had since you were a child. Its smile
reminds you of your father, who does not smile.
Nor does he believe you are his. “You look just like
your mother,” he says, “who looks just like a fire
of suspicious origin.” A body, I’ve read, can sustain
its own sick burning, its own hell, for hours.
It’s the mind. It’s the mind that cannot.
(I too cannot w/those last 7 lines in particular. goodness.)
Follow these with "candelabra," which the poet describes as a poem in which "the...second half is written in the reverse order order of the first and the last line is the 'thesis question' of the poem." (I'm too lazy for this but I'm glad she's not:)
...
Can you see them hanging? Their shadow
is a crowd stripping the tree of souvenirs.
Skin shrinks and splits. The bodies weep
fat the color of yolk. Can you smell them
burning? Their perfume climbing
as wisteria would a trellis.
=
as wisteria would a trellis.
burning? Their perfume climbing
fat the color of yolk. can you smell them
Skin shrinks and splits. The bodies weep
is a crowd stripping the trees of souvenirs.
Can you see them hanging? Their shadow
...
Google the Thomas Hirschhorn sculpture from which she borrows the title. The poem concludes "Who can look at this and not see lynchings?", a question loaded by her identity and the collective unconscious of African-Americans. It serves as a demand to see, to look- it is an indictment of the extent to which the images too often fail to inspire in white Americans what it inspires in the speaker.)
From "Legendary":
O, were I whiter than white.
...All the amenities of white:
golf courses, guesthouses...
...Whatever else white
affords, I want...
Two of nothing is something, if they're white
...
All this before we get to the cento using lines from the work of 100 poets (#againtoolazy) and my favorite moment in the book, at "in defense of 'candelabra with heads," in which Sealey doubles back to insure she hasn't been such a poet the reader missed the lynchings in "Candelabra With Heads." Referencing another version of the poem which appeared in her chapbook, THE ANIMAL AFTER WHOM OTHER ANIMALS ARE NAMED, she writes
...
I ask, "Who can see this and not see lynchings?"
not because I don't trust you, dear reader,
or my own abilities. I ask because the imagination
would have us believe, much like faith, faith
the original "Candelabra" lacks, in things unseen.
You should know that human limbs burn
like branches and branches like human limbs.
...
A hundred years from now, October 9, 2116,
8:18 p.m., when all but the lucky are good
and dead, may someone happen upon the question
in question. May that lucky someone be black
and so far removed from the verb lynch that she be
dumbfounded by its meaning. May she then
call up Hirschhorn’s Candelabra with Heads.
May her imagination, not her memory, run wild.
She explains: “This poem was written in response to an editorial decision I made at the suggestion of poets whom I respect. In my chapbook, The Animal After Whom Other Animals Are Named, the edited version of the poem ‘Candelabra with Heads’ appears, sans the original last line: ‘Who can see this and not see lynchings?’ …the original ‘Candelabra with Heads’ speaks most honestly to my intent. That said, I’ve returned the line, the question to its place in the poem.”
While this moment from "in defense..." is perhaps my favorite moment-mainly because I just like the idea of making a poem of an aside/comment on one's own work, because it's traditionally transgressive to be self-conscious of what the effect of one's work may or may not be. She could not risk the reader not seeing the lynchings she sees when looking at artwork that isn't intended to bring them to mind.
If the preceding was my favorite moment in the book, the concluding poem is my favorite poem-I'm a huge fan of (good) like/love/infatuation/(tasteful) sexual poetry. From "object permanence", for the poet's husband, poet John Murrillo:
We wake as if surprised the other is still there,
each petting the sheet to be sure.
...Though we're not so self-
important as to think everything
has led to this, everything has led to this.
...
O, how we entertain the angels
with our brief animation. O,
how I'll miss you when we're dead.
-----------------------------
Cons: "the brief animation." "Beast" leaves you wanting about 10 more pages-there's so many great pieces the "merely" good pieces stand out in a way that they wouldn't in a book perhaps 10-12 pages longer. (To extend the record analogy, think of an EP w/one song you play less as opposed to the 15 track album w/2 skips. Or a book the length of the deservedly legendary CITIZEN by C. Rankine, where the importance and power on so many of the pages affords the luxury of there being less such effect on others.)
This is the best collection I've read this year. Highly recommended.
I started reading this book in a sandwich shop near my job and wanted it to be good. I know the author and while I had seen enough of her work to give me confidence that it'd be really good, sometimes you read individual poems you like only to get to the full-length and find all the singles were hot but the rest of the album ain't hittin'. After the first three poems, concluding with "candelabra with heads", the third poem, written in a form the poet calls obverse (an obverse?), I laughed out loud, too loud-and looked around, worried someone had noticed. As for the book, it was quite evident I needn't have worried-Ms. Sealey knows what she's doing.
The book starts w/ "medical history." The two opening and four closing lines:
I’ve been pregnant. I’ve had sex with a man
who’s had sex with men. I can’t sleep.
...
Uncle Ken, wise as he was, was hit
by a car as if to disprove whatever theory
toward which I write. And, I understand,
the stars in the sky are already dead.
One poem in and I'm invested.
A Violence
You hear the high-pitched yowls of strays
fighting for scraps tossed from a kitchen window.
They sound like children you might have had.
Had you wanted children. Had you a maternal bone,
you would wrench it from your belly and fling it
from your fire escape. As if it were the stubborn
shard now lodged in your wrist. No, you would hide it.
Yes, you would hide it inside a barren nesting doll
you’ve had since you were a child. Its smile
reminds you of your father, who does not smile.
Nor does he believe you are his. “You look just like
your mother,” he says, “who looks just like a fire
of suspicious origin.” A body, I’ve read, can sustain
its own sick burning, its own hell, for hours.
It’s the mind. It’s the mind that cannot.
(I too cannot w/those last 7 lines in particular. goodness.)
Follow these with "candelabra," which the poet describes as a poem in which "the...second half is written in the reverse order order of the first and the last line is the 'thesis question' of the poem." (I'm too lazy for this but I'm glad she's not:)
...
Can you see them hanging? Their shadow
is a crowd stripping the tree of souvenirs.
Skin shrinks and splits. The bodies weep
fat the color of yolk. Can you smell them
burning? Their perfume climbing
as wisteria would a trellis.
=
as wisteria would a trellis.
burning? Their perfume climbing
fat the color of yolk. can you smell them
Skin shrinks and splits. The bodies weep
is a crowd stripping the trees of souvenirs.
Can you see them hanging? Their shadow
...
Google the Thomas Hirschhorn sculpture from which she borrows the title. The poem concludes "Who can look at this and not see lynchings?", a question loaded by her identity and the collective unconscious of African-Americans. It serves as a demand to see, to look- it is an indictment of the extent to which the images too often fail to inspire in white Americans what it inspires in the speaker.)
From "Legendary":
O, were I whiter than white.
...All the amenities of white:
golf courses, guesthouses...
...Whatever else white
affords, I want...
Two of nothing is something, if they're white
...
All this before we get to the cento using lines from the work of 100 poets (#againtoolazy) and my favorite moment in the book, at "in defense of 'candelabra with heads," in which Sealey doubles back to insure she hasn't been such a poet the reader missed the lynchings in "Candelabra With Heads." Referencing another version of the poem which appeared in her chapbook, THE ANIMAL AFTER WHOM OTHER ANIMALS ARE NAMED, she writes
...
I ask, "Who can see this and not see lynchings?"
not because I don't trust you, dear reader,
or my own abilities. I ask because the imagination
would have us believe, much like faith, faith
the original "Candelabra" lacks, in things unseen.
You should know that human limbs burn
like branches and branches like human limbs.
...
A hundred years from now, October 9, 2116,
8:18 p.m., when all but the lucky are good
and dead, may someone happen upon the question
in question. May that lucky someone be black
and so far removed from the verb lynch that she be
dumbfounded by its meaning. May she then
call up Hirschhorn’s Candelabra with Heads.
May her imagination, not her memory, run wild.
She explains: “This poem was written in response to an editorial decision I made at the suggestion of poets whom I respect. In my chapbook, The Animal After Whom Other Animals Are Named, the edited version of the poem ‘Candelabra with Heads’ appears, sans the original last line: ‘Who can see this and not see lynchings?’ …the original ‘Candelabra with Heads’ speaks most honestly to my intent. That said, I’ve returned the line, the question to its place in the poem.”
While this moment from "in defense..." is perhaps my favorite moment-mainly because I just like the idea of making a poem of an aside/comment on one's own work, because it's traditionally transgressive to be self-conscious of what the effect of one's work may or may not be. She could not risk the reader not seeing the lynchings she sees when looking at artwork that isn't intended to bring them to mind.
If the preceding was my favorite moment in the book, the concluding poem is my favorite poem-I'm a huge fan of (good) like/love/infatuation/(tasteful) sexual poetry. From "object permanence", for the poet's husband, poet John Murrillo:
We wake as if surprised the other is still there,
each petting the sheet to be sure.
...Though we're not so self-
important as to think everything
has led to this, everything has led to this.
...
O, how we entertain the angels
with our brief animation. O,
how I'll miss you when we're dead.
-----------------------------
Cons: "the brief animation." "Beast" leaves you wanting about 10 more pages-there's so many great pieces the "merely" good pieces stand out in a way that they wouldn't in a book perhaps 10-12 pages longer. (To extend the record analogy, think of an EP w/one song you play less as opposed to the 15 track album w/2 skips. Or a book the length of the deservedly legendary CITIZEN by C. Rankine, where the importance and power on so many of the pages affords the luxury of there being less such effect on others.)
This is the best collection I've read this year. Highly recommended.
December 27, 2020
This is a brief (compared to some) debut with some really powerful moments. I think that the meditations on mortality will stick with me the longest, but I am also glad that she doesn’t only focus on that theme or only speak in a severe tone. The poem about Clue is awesome, and the book-closing poem will have you rereading it. This was read out loud to me on a drive, and that really highlighted some of the poet’s rhyme that may have otherwise escaped me, but I can’t really comment on line breaks or anything like that. Looking forward to more from this author.
August 31, 2020
31/31
Of course I had to end with Nicole Sealey’s book. And I am so glad I did. This is a stunning collection, playful and mournful, formal and loose, and always engaging. I can’t choose one, so here’s a link to some of her poems (https://poets.org/poems/nicole-sealey), and to the one that may be my favorite--“Object Permanence” (https://www.aprweb.org/poems/object-p...), but I don’t want to choose!
#SealeyChallenge #NicoleSealey
Of course I had to end with Nicole Sealey’s book. And I am so glad I did. This is a stunning collection, playful and mournful, formal and loose, and always engaging. I can’t choose one, so here’s a link to some of her poems (https://poets.org/poems/nicole-sealey), and to the one that may be my favorite--“Object Permanence” (https://www.aprweb.org/poems/object-p...), but I don’t want to choose!
#SealeyChallenge #NicoleSealey
January 1, 2023
“When I hear news of a hitchhiker struck by lightning yet living, or a child lifting a two-ton sedan to free his father pinned underneath, or a camper fighting off a grizzly with her bare hands until someone, a hunter perhaps, can shoot it dead, my thoughts turn to black people— the hysterical strength we must possess to survive our very existence, which I fear many believe is, and treat as, itself a freak occurrence.”
June 30, 2018
i loved this book. i love how many selves Sealey is willing to expose without every feeling as if we're staring at gaping wounds in a voyeuristic way. I loved it. read it if you think you might love things i love.
January 16, 2020
the deeper the poem goes the more you understand. there's a rhythm to each poem and it's the most powerful rhythm i've seen yet. under 100 pages long and so moving. so poignant. a book i am so glad to have read.
August 4, 2020
4.5/5 - i really loved this collection, just wish it was longer. the "clue" poems and the "in defense of..." were excellent as well as "object permance" and so many others. like those "legendary" sonnets? i weep 🥺
// read for day 3 of the sealey challenge!
// read for day 3 of the sealey challenge!
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