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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

"Rivera’s epic journey to becoming himself requires multiple starts that vary in their truths, or their resonances." from my review of Roque Raquel Salas Rivera's Algarabía: www.thekalliope.org/review-algar...

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REVIEW: Algarabía (Graywolf, 2025)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

@garvansam.bsky.social "Swensen’s book participates in between a poetics of the impromptu and a poetics of the consistently meaningful. It’s a position similar to the relationship American poetry has to the cooked and the raw." from my review of Cole Swensen's Veer www.thekalliope.org/review-veer

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REVIEW: Veer (Alice James Books, 2026)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

"What if we were to resurrect the overwhelming fact of so much nature existing around people, and rethink what thinking is." from my review of Cody-Rose Clevidence's The Grimace of Eden, Now: www.thekalliope.org/review-the-g...

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REVIEW: The Grimace of Eden, Now (Fonograf, 2024)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

"Perhaps this tension between volatility and direction could be seen as the primary anchor for Rosie Stockton’s Fuel. Especially as those ideas might relate to the actions taken on either side of a romantic relationship." from my review of Rosie Stockton's Fuel: www.thekalliope.org/review-fuel

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REVIEW: Fuel (Nightboat Books, 2025)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

"I’m glad that Molly Ledbetter definitely has things she likes and doesn’t like, and she thinks about it carefully. And I’m glad she writes in this style that gets in my head like it does." from my review of Molly Ledbetter's Air Ball www.thekalliope.org/review-air-b...

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REVIEW: Air Ball (After Hours Editions, 2025)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

"Reading Warren is like saying the word “assiduous” to yourself, for the thick sensation it puts in your mouth and for the actual definition of the word." from my review of Alli Warren's I Love It Though www.thekalliope.org/review-i-lov...

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REVIEW: I Love It Though (Nightboat, 2017)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 24/07/2026

"One of the foundations for this book involves a critique of the capitalist terminology that contributes to “ownership.” What is it to own? How close does the owned object exist to the owner?" from my review of Robyn Schiff's A Woman of Property www.thekalliope.org/review-a-wom...

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REVIEW: A Woman of Property (Penguin, 2016)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

"The might happen tone in Courtney Bush is somewhere between the dread I often feel in Sandra Simonds’s poems and the tenuousness in Megan Fernandes’s work. Tense, tense, tense." from my review of Courtney Bush's I Love Information www.thekalliope.org/review-i-lov...

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REVIEW: I Love Information (Milkweed Editions, 2023)

Do you have an unhealthy obsession? Someone who’s always on the margins. That weird game some couples play with a “hall pass.” Where they keep infidelity in the margins, I guess so there’s always a po...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

"Prepare for a book that takes you deep into domestic poeticness. The inside of a house morphing into the inside of an apartment morphing into a photograph catching the view from a window looking out at the clothesline." from my review of Zach Savich's Momently www.thekalliope.org/review-momen...

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REVIEW: Momently (Black Ocean, 2024)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

"Talone's poems’ reactiveness. Like that soft life inside a throat. Its sensitivities precluding a complete sentence’s worth of reflection." from my review of Bridget Talone's The Soft Life www.thekalliope.org/review-the-s...

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REVIEW: The Soft Life (Wonder, 2018)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

"In many ways Walsh is a poet urging his reader to stay the moment, pause it, even as the language he uses to make the moment pushes that moment past itself." from my review of Michael Joseph Walsh's A Season: www.thekalliope.org/review-a-sea...

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REVIEW: A Season (University of Georgia Press, 2026)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

"Nadelberg’s sentences feel more subtle. Like holding wet sand. The subtle shifts if you start moving your hand." from my review of Amanda Nadelberg's Shake Until Cloudy www.thekalliope.org/review-shake...

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REVIEW: Shake Until Cloudy (The Song Cave, 2026)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

"What do you do to think about sex? Do you move in your seat? Do you text? Do you remember that song by Salt n Peppa, where everyone in the band wants to talk about sex. Caroline Rayner was there." from my review of Craoline Rayner's The Moan Wilds www.thekalliope.org/review-the-m...

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REVIEW: The Moan Wilds (Shabby Doll House, 2023)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

"If you can relax into a state of mind that moves like a spiral, and coalesces like spirals, you’ll be in the right headspace for reading Ochoa’s book." from my review of Antonio Ochoa's Small Sargasso Mountains / Pequeñas Cordilleras de Sargazo www.thekalliope.org/review-small...

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micro-REVIEW: Small Sargasso Mountains / Pequeñas cordilleras de sargazo (Nightboat, 2026)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

"With an elaborate intimacy. The sharing dreams type of intimacy. And by sharing, I mean the poet has asked her friends to submit their dreams for inclusion in her book." from my review of Kay Gabriel's Perverts www.thekalliope.org/review-perve...

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REVIEW: Perverts (Nightboat, 2025)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

"When Alisoun sings in Caroline Bergvall’s book Alisoun Sings, she relates the long reach of unheard feminist thinking throughout history." from my review of Caroline Bergvall's Alisoun Sings: www.thekalliope.org/review-aliso...

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REVIEW: Alisoun Sings (Nightboat, 2019)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 29/05/2026

"There is something to Wong’s poems that have contradiction at their center. Or there’s contradiction, and then there’s also the the tightened poetic phrasing based on torqued enjambment and slashes in the middle of lines." from my review of Stella Wong's Stem: www.thekalliope.org/review-stem

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REVIEW: Stem (Princeton University Press, 2024)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 26/05/2026

"The poems Chen crafts express a vivid and especially visual interpretation of concession. Like the space displaced should should have overwhelmed the poet, and to a degree it does." from my review of Yongyu Chen's Perennial Counterpart: www.thekalliope.org/review-peren...

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REVIEW: Perennial Counterpart (Nightboat, 2026)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

"I read Browne’s poems as a caution against love. Because there is a way love can sublime the world. It can unfold the world, like watching a dance troupe shape itself into a flower blooming." from my review of Mahogany L. Browne's Chrome Valley: www.thekalliope.org/review-chrom...

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REVIEW: Chrome Valley (Liveright, 2023)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

"One of the challenges of books that avidly embrace a larger project is negotiating the immensity felt by the poet and the actual content the poet is going to give the reader access to." from my review of Sophia Terazawa's Oracular Maladies www.thekalliope.org/review-oracu...

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REVIEW: Oracular Maladies (Noemi, 2026)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 03/05/2026

"Alidio’s Traceable Relation addresses the didactic. In particular, the presumption that didactic writing could truly lead its reader to a set meaning, leading to meanings through a variety of mediums." from my review of Kimberly Alidio's Traceable Relation: www.thekalliope.org/review-trace...

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REVIEW: Traceable Relation (Fonograf, 2025)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

"But there is a depth to disaster that dwells in the personal. It’s a rhythm the disaster uses to play through the body. It’s a portioning, as Triplett reveals in Bad Forecast." from my review of Steffan Triplett's Bad Forecast www.thekalliope.org/review-bad-f...

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REVIEW: Bad Forecast (Essay Press, 2024)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 08/04/2026

"Like these are the monologues when you barely have time to think. Because the glamorous life is always pressing in on the self." from my review of Sadie Dupuis's Cry Perfume www.thekalliope.org/review-cry-p...

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micro-REVIEW: Cry Perfume (Black Ocean, 2022)

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

Cindy Juyong Ok's translations in a recent issue of Gulf Coast were so good. I took some extra time to write about Kim Hyesoon's "In Front of a Round Wall" www.thekalliope.org/everything-c...

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Everything comes back in a form of

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

"On another level, though, the book is about women growing through girlhood to arrive at what seems inevitable, the life of a mother." from my review of Diamond Forde's The Book of Alice www.thekalliope.org/review-the-b...

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REVIEW: The Book of Alice (Scribner, 2026) | Notion

General Thoughts

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

"Unfortunately, the lyric does not ensure 1:1 representation, especially when it comes to something like generational trauma." from my review of Asiya Wadud's No Knowledge Is Complete Until It Passes Through My Body www.thekalliope.org/review-no-kn...

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REVIEW: No Knowledge Is Complete Until It Passes Through My Body (Nightboat, 2021) | Notion

General Thoughts

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

"Zhang’s book feels like family, being trapped in family. Or being trapped in that moment when you’re getting shit off your chest, maybe about someone named Michael..." from my review of Jenny Zhang's Dear Jenny, We Are All Find www.thekalliope.org/review-dear-...

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REVIEW: Dear Jenny, We Are All Find (Octopus Books, 2012) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

"The glacier leaves the impression of stagnancy; it’s literally frozen in time. And this reality makes it an especially sharp analogy for grief." from my review of Danika Stegeman's Ablation: www.thekalliope.org/review-ablat...

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REVIEW: Ablation (11:11 Press, 2023) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

"She is often weighted with a concern to really understand what concerns her. And out of those layering concerns, a series of impressions emerge. But those impressions aren’t presented in a syllogistic style." from my review of Tracy Fuad's Portal www.thekalliope.org/review-portal

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REVIEW: Portal (University of Chicago Press, 2024) | Notion

General Thoughts

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

"For me, Molnar’s lyric essay, “Minutes: A Remembrance” comes closest to the layering complexity I appreciated in her first book, CHORUS." from my review of Daniela Naomi Molnar's Protocols: An Erasure www.thekalliope.org/review-proto...

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REVIEW: Protocols: An Erasure (Ayin Press, 2025) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

"The poems are more about nature framing what the poet has to say. Or nature blurring past the natural environment so you can read the human nature feeling you get while you’re in nature!" from my review of Ben Estes's ABC Moonlight www.thekalliope.org/review-abc-m...

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micro-REVIEW: ABC Moonlight (The Song Cave, 2022) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 01/03/2026

"Bludworth de Barrio’s poetics feels like an atonal orchestral work. The kind whose notes touch the familiar, but also deviate from that familiarity in an unsettling but satisfactory fashion." from my review of Emily Bludworth de Barrios's Rich Wife www.thekalliope.org/review-rich-...

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REVIEW: Rich Wife (University of Wisconsin Press, 2025) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 25/02/2026

"That’s what Stephanie Cawley’s book is about. Being in the middle of systems, whether it’s a system called “plot” or “loving relationship” or “hot sex.” Systems that surround them like a cocoon." from my review of Stephanie Cawley's No More Flowers: www.thekalliope.org/review-no-mo...

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REVIEW: No More Flowers (Birds, LLC, 2024) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 10/02/2026

"Declaration screens from me the truth that throws the poet into declaring these things rather than granting the direct access a declarative statement would carry." from my review of Elisa Gonzalez's Grand Tour www.thekalliope.org/review-grand...

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REVIEW: Grand Tour (FSG, 2023) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 04/02/2026

"And I am trying my hardest to live a life on earth. Just like Miller has asked me to. I’d like to imagine the different spaces where you could draw an emotional cul-de-sac." from my review of Nora Claire Miller's Groceries: www.thekalliope.org/review-groce...

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micro-REVIEW: Groceries (Fonograf, 2025) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 03/02/2026

What G. C. Waldrep does with "grievance" and faith in this poem published a while ago in Bennington Review is remarkable. Who lodges grievance with whom in a relationship with God? www.thekalliope.org/it-s-never-t...

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It's never the full trespass that's forgiven | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 29/01/2026

"I’ve heard him described as a political poet. Capable of seeing what political structures are borne out of people living in a city, living in northern climates. Arranged according to these political structures." from my review of George Oppen's This In Which: www.thekalliope.org/review-this-...

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REVIEW: This In Which (New Directions, 1965) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 28/01/2026

"How does the cheerleader fit alongside the considerate math teacher fit alongside the aging woman whose private life feels distant from the feminine life she’d occupied." from my review of Laura Read's But She Is Also Jane www.thekalliope.org/review-but-s...

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REVIEW: But She Is Also Jane (University of Massachusetts Press, 2023) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 21/01/2026

"But where Smith lays out order, with boxes boxing one another in, Webb’s garden, or her house lays out the bewildering heaven she occupies in her grief." from my micro-REVIEW of Lindsey Webb's Plat: www.thekalliope.org/micro-review...

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micro-REVIEW: Plat (Archway Editions, 2024) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

Ryan Taylor has captured the poetry existing in the between space of "masculinity" and "Americanism" in his poem "American Planet." I've written an enthusiastic consideration of that space at the link. www.thekalliope.org/Not-just-a-p...

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Not just a postcard! | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 11/01/2026

"Some might say the key to enjoying a Natalie Shapero poem is knowing how to laugh." from my review of Natalie Shapero's Stay Dead www.thekalliope.org/review-stay-...

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REVIEW: Stay Dead (Copper Canyon, 2025) | Notion

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 09/01/2026

"Her genre is not the instruction manual. More like what do you feel like immediately after you’ve read a set of instructions." from my recent review of Valerie Hsiung's The Naif: www.thekalliope.org/review-the-n...

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micro-REVIEW: The Naif (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2024)

A microreview of Valerie Hsiung's collection, The Naif.

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 20/11/2025

"Koestenbaum is really into reality, and art is reality or runway or state of mind or perspective or a bunch of lewd acts that puts the randy in a name like “Randy.” Include the quotations." from my goodreads review of Wayne Koestenbaum's Stubble Archipelago www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of Stubble Archipelago

4/5: OK. I got it now. Or maybe I get it. I don’t know whether to read Wayne Koestenbaum in the present tense or the past. Like walking down the street must be a present tense activity, but you can on...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 13/11/2025

"His poems belong to whatever space is carved when the world, or the place you’re from, or the dominant culture, sets a fire, and everywhere you look, it rings around your existence." from my goodreads review of Isaac Pickell's It's not over once you figure it out www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of It's not over once you figure it out

5/5: I’m always at the mercy of that William Wordsworth poem, “The World Is Too Much With Us.” Like the title alone serves as refrain for all my discontents, or feelings in general, or just navigating...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 06/11/2025

"In essence, the poems fashion the self as a delicate formation. Someone who’s in process, in transition to a new outlook on life, with a new self to do that looking." from my goodreads review of Shelley Wong's As She Appears www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of As She Appears

4/5: There is a focus of self in Shelley Wong’s As She Appears. Like a self can be constructed in sentimental ways. A sensuality to independence. It’s common to note how pleasurable it is to learn who...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 30/10/2025

"Nordgren’s book is hard for me to describe. Maybe it’s writing that got caught in costume. Dressed as a period piece for a fashion magazine." from my goodreads review of Sarah Rose Nordgren's Feathers: A Bird-Hat Wearer's Journal www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of Feathers

5/5: Nordgren’s book is hard for me to describe. Maybe it’s writing that got caught in costume. Dressed as a period piece for a fashion magazine. Maybe it’s an occasional notebook for inscribing obser...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 24/10/2025

"It’s like Ashbery wants you to combine a lava lamp with a villanelle. First, a line with an imaginative twist on a present circumstance, and by the next line it’s morphed into a different shape." from my goodreads review of Hotel Lautréamont, by John Ashbery www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of Hotel Lautréamont

4/5: I don’t think it had occurred to me why I should read Ashbery through Wallace Stevens before this book. Like poetic history is clear that the two are connected, and I could see the sense to it. B...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 07/10/2025

"The relationship between irony and wonder often feels uneven to me. Irony is so tall, incisive, and imposing on a sentence or a poem" from my goodreads review of Rosmarie Waldrop's The Nick of Time www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of The Nick of Time

5/5: The relationship between irony and wonder often feels uneven to me. Irony is so tall, incisive, and imposing on a sentence or a poem. Yes, I appreciate what irony can bring to a moment. But often...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 28/09/2025

"In Zhou’s book, the triangulation is more sustained. Which allows for especially evocative commentary on who she perceives herself to be, and who she is now after the different pressures that come with adulthood." from my goodreads review of Amelia Zhou's Repose www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of Repose

5/5: How is the self formed? And should this self-actualization be staged as a form-ing process or a formationed reality? These, to me, are the underlying questions of Amelia Zhou’s book. Like how poe...

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Kent Shaw @kentdshaw.bsky.social · 23/09/2025

"In here, doing-ness revolves mainly around the temporality or shapeliness of an impression. What it takes to experience a moment, while many other moments inflect upon your experience of that moment." from my goodreads review of Bill Carty's We Sailed on the Lake www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

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Kent's review of We Sailed on the Lake

5/5: There is a shape to the poetic impressions in Bill Carty’s We Sailed on the Lake. A shape like a lake, I suppose. If you think of “shape” as what a lake looks like when you’re watching the mist h...

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