{"product_id":"no-matter-isbn-9781984825117","title":"No Matter","description":"\u003cb\u003eAn urgent, visionary collection of poems from the author of \u003ci\u003eThe After Party\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e“One of the most original voices of her generation.”—James Wood\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eNAMED ONE OF THE BEST POETRY BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY \u003ci\u003eTHE NEW YORK TIMES \u003c\/i\u003eAND \u003ci\u003eTHE PARIS REVIEW\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJana Prikryl’s \u003ci\u003eNo Matter\u003c\/i\u003e guides the reader through cities—remembered and imagined—toppling past the point of decline and fall. Conjured by voices alternately ardent, caustic, grieving, but always watchful, these soliloquies move from free verse through sonnets and invented forms, insisting that every demolition builds something new and unforeseen. In reactionary times, these poems say, we each have a responsibility to use our imagination.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eNo Matter\u003c\/i\u003e is an elegy for our ongoing moment, when what seemed permanent suddenly appears to be on the brink of disappearing.\"One of the most original voices of her generation has produced a second brilliant book. These poems, urban and urbane, offbeat and stringent, welcome the reader with a beguiling lucidity; but that sparkling surface, as in the best John Ashbery poems, hides an obliquity that turns out to be provocative and sometimes complexly self-unraveling. Nothing is quite as it seems—'like the East River pretending \/ to be a river when it's merely an appetite'—and the world is estranged and transfigured in this enchanting work. My idea of the good life would be a new Jana Prikryl poem, served daily with my breakfast, till the end of my days.\" \u003cb\u003e—James Wood\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eNo Matter\u003c\/i\u003e sounds, to me, like the way we live now. . . . Prikryl is someone who came to New York as an adult, and her demographics inform the emotional life in her work – just as they did with Whitman.”\u003cb\u003e—Stephanie Burt, \u003ci\u003eHarper’s\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Prikryl is a shrewd and delicately severe writer with a remarkable gift for observation—'Salon’ is the definitive take on the sociology of getting your nails done, and the poems titled ‘Anonymous’ are dry, precise sketches of old photographic portraits in which the tone is so even you could build a tower of dominoes on it.”\u003cb\u003e—David Orr, \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“Welcome Prikryl to the club of great New York City poets. Everything about her verse unsettles: the surprising line breaks, the slightly off-kilter syntax, the shifts from philosophical lyricism (‘seeing \/ with sudden candor, which is \/ to unsee time’) to technological absurdism: ‘And do you suppose if there’d been phones that \/ Dido would have chilled, monitored his posts \/ as he sailed into a storm . . .'”\u003cb\u003e—Anthony Domestico, \u003ci\u003eCommonweal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“Prikryl remains one of the few poets who could make the next ten years uncomfortable.”\u003cb\u003e—William Logan, \u003ci\u003eThe New Criterion\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eNo Matter\u003c\/i\u003e is one of the most original, bracing \u0026amp; unsettling books I’ve read in years. Its voice is mesmerizing but in a calm unnerving way. Its vision slant \u0026amp; riveting. And the mind at work sees into the unseen \u0026amp; is staggering.”\u003cb\u003e—Jorie Graham, via Twitter\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e “Prikryl is my favorite poet among my own contemporaries. She writes about being a soul in the circuitry of the 21st-century city. Her gifts include perhaps the rarest one among contemporary poets—wit, which in these poems turns out to be a survival skill.”\u003cb\u003e—Dan Chiasson\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eJana Prikryl\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of \u003ci\u003eNo Matter\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eThe After Party\u003c\/i\u003e, which was one of \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e's Best Poetry Books of the Year. Her poems have appeared in \u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe London Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Paris Review\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eThe New York Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e, where she is a senior editor and the poetry editor.Got\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eoff a stop early but no harm.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA pleasant walk. This is a different place.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLady at the counter doesn’t know it either,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eno use asking.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLucky you turned when you did\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand saw the ceiling of the Brooklyn Bridge\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enot ten feet above. Never noticed\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe whole thing’s umber, made of brownstone.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHow same this town is, same as itself, unyielding.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt gives you time, almost, to make\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eobservations such as this, it draws them out\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003elike the East River pretending\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto be a river when it’s merely an appetite.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI’ll take it from here, you think, I know the way.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJust barely convincing.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen you saw St. Peter’s down below, confirming\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethis is Dumbo\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand thought yes, finally they’ve made it right\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewith Malta: set forth on the long downward path\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof sandy steps a touch too long and shallow\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efor human locomotion faster than deep reluctance\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esouthwest, Spanish gravel, attractive, toward the church,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewhen houses on the way start exploding.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnonymous\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHer hair is parted in the center and this side\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewall of the house ends just above her part.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe seam between the house and not-­house\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eseems to rise out of the part in her hair.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDandelions on the lawn are playing\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esundials, their globes give out the time\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof year. She’s not smiling so much\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eas grimacing against the pull of the brush\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand squinting against the sun. Nowhere are\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eher feet more than tacit. She is the tallest one.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWaves\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eon the Hudson just a few inches\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eabove the crown of my head, it’s fall but the leaves\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eas green as the afternoons humid,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethey fall from the trees a halfhearted yellow,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eunswayed by the unforthcoming change.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHow you crossed that island I don’t know,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eone of the blasts must have nudged you.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe Hudson is a river though, with genuine water\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003egoing one way most of the time, a true expression.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNot much else here, of the city I knew.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe doggerel place, a place you pray\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto be delivered from through\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003enot too much exertion of your own.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI designate the gondola\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto Hog Island my second home,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emay I get carried away in perpetuity.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDeliver me as down along a zip line—­\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethese piles, these ornate cornices\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebest seen if not in enlargements of scenes\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof Myrna Loy’s xmas eve between\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emartinis then through the blinds\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof function rooms where hopefuls in colorless\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003euniforms circulate edible miniatures—­\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eeven if the view going down differs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efrom the view going up.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe city welcomes you.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe cathedral perhaps, its smoking dome\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003estill visible over the charred fastnesses\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof Village and East Village,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003estill visible when I turn.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd here we reach the shores of speculation.","brand":"Crown","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302745526501,"sku":"NP9781984825117","price":15.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781984825117.jpg?v=1767733806","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/no-matter-isbn-9781984825117","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}