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VANITAS

In this very human book, McKinley writes of the tragic childhood loss of a sister, the irrevocable turning point—evoking the search for threads of prophecy, patterns of meaning. The longing is tangible in Vanitas, delivered by messengers: Bach, Mozart, sparrows and crows; a pool of angled water that reflected golden boughs.... In a sure voice with lovely sound, McKinley's narratives are formal and evocative in their movement, asking: What does it mean to be whole?

      Jan Beatty, author of Dragstripping

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MUDMAN

I’m always delighted to learn a new word from poetry, and in marcescent—as when leaves wither yet cling to the bough—Jane McKinley has found a figure for elegy: “No time to prepare / for the loss so the dead keep rattling on.” McKinley’s heartbreaking poems are haunted by the ghosts of family and friends who have gone on before her, often much too soon. At the center of Mudman are poems—some “found” in letters—about McKinley’s father, a World War II veteran whose death continues to possess the poet’s psyche. Her many deft descriptions of nature dovetail with such losses, presenting a world in which elegy and legacy combine. A bracing, affecting collection.

 

—David Yezzi, author of More Things in Heaven: New and Selected Poems

Book no.1
Book no.2
Book no.3
© 2024 by Jane McKinley. Powered and secured by Wix
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