Description
Book SynopsisThe collection of poems in
The Reckoning of Jeanne d'Antietammcircles the U.S. Civil War and the failed revolution of Reconstruction, andmMatthew Moore makes incursions into the histories and beliefs of the era through architectures of sound, but also via ancillary histories and histories stacked upon histories—densely and visibly scrawled—like Anselm Kiefer's sculptures of lead books, melted and dripping with the texts of illegible songs. His poems include the figure of Joan of Arc (Jeanne d'Arc) and her voices; the explosion of the U.S. prison system and racial legal fictions amid the groundswell of mass terror in the wake of the U.S. Civil War; the politically poisoned poetic lineage that moves from Modernism, to New Criticism, and dead-ends in Southern Agrarianism; and the destructive colonial histories of the sugar and cotton industries.
The Reckoning of Jeanne d'Antietam stands imbricated with the spell of language-the-testament; language as hard rhyme and difficult music, evanescence and violence; and the invocation of names and events at their meeting places in history.mMoore's poems stand against sentiment and pity, and against the consolation of that which cannot be consoled.
Trade ReviewThe Reckoning of Jeanne d'Antietam collapses time in fascinating ways."—Sasha Steensen, professor of English, Colorado State University, and author of
House of Deerbr>"Moore recasts the Civil War through the eyes of a saint, and reading, I realized we are still fighting that war, day after day, in this country."—Claudia Keelan, professor of English, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, editor of
Interim, and author of eight collections of poetry, including
We Step into the SeaTable of Contents
- Contents
- The Sound Earth
- Leviathan
- I.
- Needle
- Speculative Fire
- Antiphon: For the Solar Rooster of St. John
- In Swatchel-Cove
- The Etymology of Union
- Flickering Mechanicsville
- Rappahannock Succor
- Fort Pillow Motor Inn
- Appomattox Agape
- The Boston Evening Traveller
- II.
- The Rings of Saturn
- Poison Oak Candle for Southern Agrarians
- The Vegetable Lamb's Entry into Charleston in 1858
- The Etymology of Union
- Re-Enactment
- The Gods of Repositories
- Not My Horses
- Whit Women
- Excoriated Station
- III.
- Nail Sickness: Boston Common
- Altaforte
- Bloody-Minded
- Anabasis
- Yankee Among the Swallows
- Seawall: Perjury
- The Etymology of Union
- In Heresy Relapse
- Envoi
- Mary Rowlandson Beach House for Forgiven Narcissists
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
