Sign-In
Cart
The Smallest Muscle in the Human Body
Paperback
Publisher Price: $19.00
ISBN13: 9781556591730
Publisher: Copper Canyon Press
Published: Apr 1 2002
Pages: 110
Weight: 0.45
Height: 0.31 Width: 6.34 Depth: 8.88
Language: English
Awards: National Book Awards
National Book Award finalist
Alberto RÃos explains the world not through reason but magic. These poems--set in a town that straddles Mexico and Arizona--are lyric adventures, crossing two and three boundaries as easily as one, between cultures, between languages, between senses. Drawing upon fable, parable, and family legend, RÃos utilizes the intense and supple imagination of childhood to find and preserve history beyond facts: plastic lemons turning into baseballs, a grandmother's long hair reaching up to save her life, the painted faith jumpers leaping to the earth and crowd below. This is magical realism at its shimmering best.
Alberto RÃos is a poet of reverie and magical perception, and of the threshold between this world and the world just beyond. With humor, compassion, and intelligence, RÃos's poems overlay a child's observation and imagination onto our society of daily inequity, poverty, and violence. The light of memory shines on culture, language, family, neighbors, and friends saving them all in stories that become legends, a light so sensual and full it is 'swallowed into the mouth of the eye, / into the throat of the people.'--National Book Award Judges' comments
Alberto RÃos is a poet of reverie... Whether talking about the smell of food, the essence of a crow or a bear's character or of hard-won human wisdom, RÃos writes in a serenely clear manner that enhances the drama in the quick scenes he summons up.--The New York Times Book Review
... Rios's verse inhabits a country of his own making, sometimes political, often personal, with the familiarity and pungency of an Arizona chili.--The Christian Science Monitor
Alberto RÃos is the man you want to sit next to when it is time to hear a story.--Southwest BookViews
In The Smallest Muscle in the Human Body, Alberto RÃos doesn't borrow a myth. Rather, he finds the myth underlying his own life--myth that translates effectively because it is not confined by language. The images of RÃos' life are so vivid, it is as if he has written a picture book that anyone can understand.--The Home & News Tribune
In his new book of poems, Alberto RÃos has given us evidence and motive for celebration. RÃos' poems follow a path of wonder and gently move us to emotional truths that grab our breath and link our inner and outer landscapes. His alchemy works a transformation in the inner vision, turning us toward the deeper mystery of life itself.--American Book Review
Alberto RÃos teaches at Arizona State and is the author of eight books of poetry, three collections of short stories, and a memoir about growing up on the Mexican border. He is the recipient of numerous awards and his work is included in over 175 national and international literary anthologies. His work is regularly taught and translated, and has been adapted to dance and both classical and popular music.
Also in
General Poetry
Dante's Vita Nuova, New Edition: A Translation and an Essay
Pitavy, Francois
Alighieri, Dante
Paperback
Sounding the Seasons Enlarged Edition: One Hundred and Ten Sonnets for the Christian Year
Guite, Malcolm
Paperback
Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching: A Book about the Way and the Power of the Way
Lao Tzu
Le Guin, Ursula K.
Paperback
They Bloom Because of You: Poems on the Infinite Love, Growth, and Magic of Motherhood
Urlichs, Jessica
Paperback
Ariel: The Restored Edition: A Facsimile of Plath's Manuscript, Reinstating Her Original Selection and Arrangement
Plath, Sylvia
Paperback
This Is the Main Event: Discovering the Life You Long for in the Life You Have
Smith, Joshua Luke
Hardcover