Cry Back My Sea: 48 Poems in 6 Waves (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780593319505)

Stunning poems of obsession, loss, and the desire for a renewed self, from the award-winning poet

"I thought I had left behind the darkness / of the heart," Arvio confesses in the poem "Small War." The love Arvio traces in these pages is indeed a battle, one in which the best-laid plans are shattered. Rarely has a poet tackled intimate love with so much invention and bravery.

In poem after poem, we meet the troubling lover whose nearness and force undoes her. There are moments of reprieve: "my naked body and budding pleasure / in the weather of your presence. / Not whether your presence but how." The voice is vulnerable, self-knowing, often funny; the poet seems to be writing these poems to save herself from a devastating passion. Her weapons are a cascade of brash, freely spoken lines and a powerful command of metaphor, wielded in a search for meaning and understanding.

These breathtaking love poems make the collection Arvio's most universal to date.

Author: Sarah Arvio
ISBN-10: 0593319508
ISBN-13: 9780593319505
Publisher: Knopf Publishing Group
Language: English
Published: 08/10/2021
Pages: 112
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 0.75lbs
Size: 9.20h x 6.90w x 0.70d

Review Citation(s):
Booklist 07/30/2021
Publishers Weekly 08/16/2021 pg. 61