{"product_id":"news-of-the-world-isbn-9780375711909","title":"News of the World","description":"In this “characteristically wise” (\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review)\u003c\/i\u003e collection from one of our most celebrated poets, Philip Levine brings us finely made, powerfully telling imagery from the worlds of hand, heart, and mind.“All the earmarks of a valedictory testament, what with its autumnal ruminations on personal history and its haunted remembrances of things past, yet Levine is too canny a craftsman to settle for dutiful curtain calls, and too much the hard-bitten ironist to fall prey to false nostalgia. If certain obsessions here are bound to strike longtime readers as old news (innocence and experience, manual labor and class struggle), the visceral language that fleshes the poems out still feels hot off the press.” —David Barber, \u003ci\u003eThe Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003ePhilip Levine\u003c\/b\u003e was born in 1928 in Detroit. He has received numerous awards for his poetry, including the National Book Award for \u003ci\u003eWhat Work Is\u003c\/i\u003e and the Pulitzer Prize for \u003ci\u003eThe Simple Truth.\u003c\/i\u003e He divides his time between Fresno, California, and Brooklyn, New York.OUR VALLEY\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe don't see the ocean, not ever, but in July and August \u003cbr\u003ewhen the worst heat seems to rise from the hard clay\u003cbr\u003eof this valley, you could be walking through a fig orchard\u003cbr\u003ewhen suddenly the wind cools and for a moment\u003cbr\u003eyou get a whiff of salt, and in that moment you can almost\u003cbr\u003ebelieve something is waiting beyond the Pacheco Pass,\u003cbr\u003esomething massive, irrational, and so powerful even\u003cbr\u003ethe mountains that rise east of here have no word for it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYou probably think I'm nuts saying the mountains\u003cbr\u003ehave no word for ocean, but if you live here\u003cbr\u003eyou begin to believe they know everything.\u003cbr\u003eThey maintain that huge silence we think of as divine,\u003cbr\u003ea silence that grows in autumn when snow falls\u003cbr\u003eslowly between the pines and the wind dies\u003cbr\u003eto less than a whisper and you can barely catch\u003cbr\u003eyour breath because you're thrilled and terrified.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYou have to remember this isn't your land.\u003cbr\u003eIt belongs to no one, like the sea you once lived beside\u003cbr\u003eand thought was yours. Remember the small boats\u003cbr\u003ethat bobbed out as the waves rode in, and the men\u003cbr\u003ewho carved a living from it only to find themselves\u003cbr\u003ecarved down to nothing. Now you say this is home,\u003cbr\u003eso go ahead, worship the mountains as they dissolve in dust,\u003cbr\u003ewait on the wind, catch a scent of salt, call it our life.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE HEART OF OCTOBER\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDusk south of Barcelona, the slopes\u003cbr\u003eleading up to the fortress, a city\u003cbr\u003eof wooden crates and cardboard shacks\u003cbr\u003estaggers up the mountain as the rain\u003cbr\u003eruns down, a black river. The final night,\u003cbr\u003eI whisper to no one. A patch of red,\u003cbr\u003ethe single moving thing, comes toward me\u003cbr\u003eto become the shirt of a young girl,\u003cbr\u003eeleven or twelve. Bare- legged, picking\u003cbr\u003eher way to avoid the sharp stones,\u003cbr\u003eshe reaches me. Through perfect teeth\u003cbr\u003ein her perfect mouth she demands a \u003ci\u003eduro\u003c\/i\u003e,\u003cbr\u003eone hand held out. Only one \u003ci\u003eduro\u003c\/i\u003e,\u003cbr\u003eshe insists, stamping a naked foot,\u003cbr\u003ebrowned and filthy on the filthy earth.\u003cbr\u003eWhen I pay up and turn for home\u003cbr\u003eshe is beside me laughing as the rain\u003cbr\u003estreams down her forehead, her short hair\u003cbr\u003ea black cap plastered in place. \"A \u003ci\u003eduro\u003c\/i\u003e! \"\u003cbr\u003eshe demands again. \"Another?\" I say.\u003cbr\u003e\"Yes, of course,\" she laughs into the face\u003cbr\u003eof the rain, \"and after that another.\"\u003cbr\u003eEven a child knows the meaning of rain:\u003cbr\u003eit is the gift of October, a gift\u003cbr\u003ethat arrives on time each autumn\u003cbr\u003eto darken the makeshift shacks and lighten\u003cbr\u003ethe hillside with a single splash of color.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNEWS OF THE WORLD\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOnce we were out of Barcelona the road climbed past small farm-\u003cbr\u003ehouses hunched down on the gray, chalky hillsides. The last person\u003cbr\u003ewe saw was a girl in her late teens in a black dress \u0026amp; gray apron\u003cbr\u003ecarrying a chicken upside down by the claws. She looked up \u0026amp;\u003cbr\u003esmiled. An hour later the land opened into enormous green meadows.\u003cbr\u003eAt the frontier a cop asked in guttural Spanish almost as bad\u003cbr\u003eas mine why were we going to Andorra. \"Tourism,\" I said. Laughing,\u003cbr\u003ehe waved us through. The rock walls of the valley were so\u003cbr\u003eabrupt the town was only a single street wide. Blue plumes of\u003cbr\u003esmoke ascended straight into the darkening sky. The next morning\u003cbr\u003ewe found what we'd come for: the perfect radio, French- made,\u003cbr\u003eportable, lightweight, slightly garish with its colored dial \u0026amp;\u003cbr\u003echromed knobs, inexpensive. \"Because of the mountains, reception\u003cbr\u003eis poor,\" the shop owner said, so he tuned in the local Communist\u003cbr\u003estation beamed to Spain. \"Communist?\" I said. Oh yes, they'd\u003cbr\u003ecome twenty- five years ago to escape the Germans, \u0026amp; they'd stayed.\u003cbr\u003e\"Back then,\" he said, \"we were all reds.\" \"And now?\" I said. Now\u003cbr\u003ehe could sell me anything I wanted. \"Anything?\" He nodded. A\u003cbr\u003etall, graying man, his face carved down to its essentials. \"A Cadillac?\"\u003cbr\u003eI said. Yes, of course, he could get on the phone \u0026amp; have it out\u003cbr\u003efront— he checked his pocket watch— by four in the afternoon.\u003cbr\u003e\"An American film star?\" One hand on his unshaved cheek, he\u003cbr\u003egazed upward at the dark beamed ceiling. \"That could take a week.\"","brand":"Knopf","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46305413824741,"sku":"NP9780375711909","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780375711909.jpg?v=1767733686","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/news-of-the-world-isbn-9780375711909","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}