Repeat As Needed

By turns elegiac and dishy, Brookshire invites you to a tea party of bold, crafty poets. Imitation becomes a spiritual exercise, an attempt to rewrite the past and thus heal from it. Reading these poems, you feel the frisson of recognition he must have felt encountering the work of feminist and queer icons such as Denise Duhamel, Maureen Seaton, and Andrea Gibson. He’s learned the power of detail, the possibilities of form, and an unflinching approach to experience. In the process of imitation, he has developed a unique voice that ranges from clarion confessional to arch and snarky, always in service of palpable human truth. The interplay of form and subject mirrors the ebbs and flows, joys and griefs of a community, delighting the reader with his craft, but winning us over with his heart.—Amy Lemmon, author of Saint Nobody