{"product_id":"machete-isbn-9781524711986","title":"Machete","description":"\u003cb\u003eThis fresh voice in American poetry wields lyric pleasure and well-honed insight against a cruel century that would kill us with a thousand cuts.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"Morín's writing uses the mundane details of everyday life...as a jumping-off point for creating fascinating and philosophical worlds.\" —\u003ci\u003eLitHub\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Dios aprieta, pero no ahorca\" (\"God squeezes, but He doesn't strangle\")--the epigraph of \u003ci\u003eMachete\u003c\/i\u003e--sets the stage for a powerful poet who summons a variety of ways to endure life when there's an invisible hand at your throat. Tomás Morín hails from the coastal plains of Texas, and explores a world where identity and place shift like that ever-changing shore. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn these poems, culture crashes like waves and leaves behind Billie Holiday and the CIA, disco balls and Dante, the Bible and Jerry Maguire. They are long, lean, and dazzle in their telling: \"Whiteface\" is a list of instructions for people stopped by the police; \"Duct Tape\" lauds our domestic life from the point of view of the tape itself. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOne part Groucho Marx, one part Job, Morín considers our obsession with suffering--\"the pain in which we trust\"--and finds that the best answer to our predicament is sometimes anger, sometimes laughter, but always via the keen line between them that may be the sharpest weapon we have.\"Morín's writing uses the mundane details of everyday life...as a jumping-off point for creating fascinating and philosophical worlds.\" \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eLitHub\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"[Morín’s] writing cuts to the core with electrifying force . . . A promising and powerful new voice in American poetry, the Texas native arrives with a revealing anthology about suffering, self-identity and the trivial occasions that tie one’s existence together . . . If you’re not a big fan of poetry, \u003ci\u003eMachete\u003c\/i\u003e will make you one.\" —Nicholas Addison Thomas, \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Free Lance-Star\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"In his new collection, \u003ci\u003eMachete\u003c\/i\u003e, Mórin questions how to prepare his son for life in modern America. He explores the country’s legacy of racism and the importance of joy as a survival tool.\"\u003cb\u003e —\u003ci\u003eTexas Standard\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Wonderfully intimate . . . Highlights Morín’s versatility as a poet who fuses both content and form . . . I would rush out to buy\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003ea copy of \u003ci\u003eMachete\u003c\/i\u003e just to have a poem like ‘Two Dolphins’ on hand. Not only was I captivated by the sheer beauty and dexterity of the poem but I was struck by how rare it is to come across poems about fatherhood . . . If Morín wields language like a machete, it’s to slash through ignorance, to clear a path for strollering his children onto a sidewalk, safe from traffic.” \u003cb\u003e—Julie Poole, \u003ci\u003eTexas Observer\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Perceptive . . . Asks readers to go beyond seeing the world at face value, offering vivid descriptions and cutting political critique . . . Playful and piercing, this impressive collection demonstrates a radical kind of empathy.” —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eTOMÁS Q. MORÍN is the author of the memoir \u003ci\u003eLet Me Count the Ways\u003c\/i\u003e, winner of the 2023 Vulgar Genius Nonfiction Award, as well as the poetry collections \u003ci\u003ePatient Zero\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eA Larger Country\u003c\/i\u003e. He is coeditor, with Mari L'Esperance, of the anthology \u003ci\u003eComing Close\u003c\/i\u003e: \u003ci\u003eForty Essays on Philip Levine\u003c\/i\u003e and a translator of \u003ci\u003eThe Heights of Macchu Picchu\u003c\/i\u003e by Pablo Neruda. He teaches at Rice University and Vermont College of Fine Arts. Morín lives with his family in Texas.I Sing the Body Aquatic \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen I offer my sweaty hand in greeting \u003cbr\u003eI can see the future. No matter how gently you squeeze, I know \u003cbr\u003ewhen our hands meet you will crowd my crooked index and pinkie fingers \u003cbr\u003eagainst  their  straight-as-an-arrow  brothers \u003cbr\u003eso that my hand looks more like a fin \u003cbr\u003ethan an appendage perfectly evolved \u003cbr\u003efor tying shoelaces or wiping a tear \u003cbr\u003efrom the red face of the missionary \u003cbr\u003ewho rode his bicycle under the sun \u003cbr\u003eall day to reach my porch. \u003cbr\u003eWhen he takes my hand he won’t find hope \u003cbr\u003eor brotherhood or whatever he’s looking for. Because I can see \u003cbr\u003ethe future at times like this \u003cbr\u003eand because I have an unshakable faith in the law of averages, I know \u003cbr\u003ewhen our hands embrace he’ll find \u003cbr\u003eproof of natural selection\u003cbr\u003e in the shape of my fingers, evolutionary \u003cbr\u003eholdovers from an era of gills \u003cbr\u003ewhen the earth was all aquarium \u003cbr\u003eand some distant relative with sleepy eyes \u003cbr\u003eand splayed fins who tired of being mocked by handsome carp said, To hell with it","brand":"Knopf","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46299790868709,"sku":"NP9781524711986","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781524711986.jpg?v=1767732009","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/machete-isbn-9781524711986","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}