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Pity the Beautiful: Poems
The long-awaited fourth collection by one of America's foremost poets
O Lord of indirection and ellipses,
ignore our prayers. Deliver us from distraction.
Slow our heartbeat to a cricket's call.
--from “Prophecy”
Pity the Beautiful is Dana Gioia's first new poetry book in over a decade. Its emotional revelations and careful construction are hard won, inventive, and resilient. These new poems show Gioia's craftsmanship at its finest, its most mature, as they make music, crack wise, remember the dead, and in a long, central poem even tell ghost stories.
O Lord of indirection and ellipses,
ignore our prayers. Deliver us from distraction.
Slow our heartbeat to a cricket's call.
--from “Prophecy”
Pity the Beautiful is Dana Gioia's first new poetry book in over a decade. Its emotional revelations and careful construction are hard won, inventive, and resilient. These new poems show Gioia's craftsmanship at its finest, its most mature, as they make music, crack wise, remember the dead, and in a long, central poem even tell ghost stories.
- GenresPoetry
73 pages, Paperback
First published May 8, 2012
8 people are currently reading
322 people want to read
About the author
Dana Gioia
171 books118 followersDana Gioia is an internationally acclaimed and award-winning poet. Former Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, Gioia is a native Californian of Italian and Mexican descent. He received a B.A. and a M.B.A. from Stanford University and an M.A. in Comparative Literature from Harvard University. (Gioia is pronounced JOY-uh.)
Gioia has published four full-length collections of poetry, as well as eight chapbooks. His poetry collection, Interrogations at Noon, won the 2002 American Book Award. An influential critic as well, Gioia's 1991 volume Can Poetry Matter?, which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award, is credited with helping to revive the role of poetry in American public culture.
Gioia's reviews have appeared in many magazines including The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Washington Post Book World, The New York Times Book Review, Slate, and The Hudson Review. Gioia has written two opera libretti and is an active translator of poetry from Latin, Italian, and German.
As Chairman of the NEA, Gioia succeeded in garnering enthusiastic bi-partisan support in the United States Congress for the mission of the Arts Endowment, as well as in strengthening the national consensus in favor of public funding for the arts and arts education. (Business Week Magazine referred to him as "The Man Who Saved the NEA.")
Gioia's creation of a series of NEA National Initiatives combined with a wider distribution of direct grants to reach previously underserved communities making the agency truly national in scope. Through programs such as Shakespeare in American Communities, Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience, NEA Jazz Masters, American Masterpieces, and Poetry Out Loud, the Arts Endowment has successfully reached millions of Americans in all corners of the country.
The Big Read became the largest literary program in the history of the federal government. By the end of 2008, 400 communities had held month-long celebrations of great literature. Because of these successes as well as the continued artistic excellence of the NEA's core grant programs, the Arts Endowment, under Chairman Gioia, reestablished itself as a preeminent federal agency and a leader in the arts and arts education.
Renominated in November 2006 for a second term and once again unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Dana Gioia is the ninth Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.
Gioia left his position as Chairman on January 22, 2009. In 2011 Gioia became the Judge Widney Professor of Poetry and Public Culture at the University of Southern California where he teaches each fall semester.
Gioia has been the recipient of ten honorary degrees. He has won numerous awards, including the 2010 Laetare Medal from Notre Dame. He and his wife, Mary, have two sons. He divides his time between Los Angeles and Sonoma County, California
Gioia has published four full-length collections of poetry, as well as eight chapbooks. His poetry collection, Interrogations at Noon, won the 2002 American Book Award. An influential critic as well, Gioia's 1991 volume Can Poetry Matter?, which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award, is credited with helping to revive the role of poetry in American public culture.
Gioia's reviews have appeared in many magazines including The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Washington Post Book World, The New York Times Book Review, Slate, and The Hudson Review. Gioia has written two opera libretti and is an active translator of poetry from Latin, Italian, and German.
As Chairman of the NEA, Gioia succeeded in garnering enthusiastic bi-partisan support in the United States Congress for the mission of the Arts Endowment, as well as in strengthening the national consensus in favor of public funding for the arts and arts education. (Business Week Magazine referred to him as "The Man Who Saved the NEA.")
Gioia's creation of a series of NEA National Initiatives combined with a wider distribution of direct grants to reach previously underserved communities making the agency truly national in scope. Through programs such as Shakespeare in American Communities, Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience, NEA Jazz Masters, American Masterpieces, and Poetry Out Loud, the Arts Endowment has successfully reached millions of Americans in all corners of the country.
The Big Read became the largest literary program in the history of the federal government. By the end of 2008, 400 communities had held month-long celebrations of great literature. Because of these successes as well as the continued artistic excellence of the NEA's core grant programs, the Arts Endowment, under Chairman Gioia, reestablished itself as a preeminent federal agency and a leader in the arts and arts education.
Renominated in November 2006 for a second term and once again unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Dana Gioia is the ninth Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.
Gioia left his position as Chairman on January 22, 2009. In 2011 Gioia became the Judge Widney Professor of Poetry and Public Culture at the University of Southern California where he teaches each fall semester.
Gioia has been the recipient of ten honorary degrees. He has won numerous awards, including the 2010 Laetare Medal from Notre Dame. He and his wife, Mary, have two sons. He divides his time between Los Angeles and Sonoma County, California
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 48 reviews
July 13, 2015
I bought this poetry book from a second-hand bookshop a few weeks ago. It's my first Dana Gioia poetry book and in the spirit of full disclosure, I must admit this is the first time I encountered his name.
So... I delved in with no expectations whatsoever. All I can say is that, after reading, I thank my lucky stars I picked up this book randomly and decided to purchase it after a few moments of hesitation.
His poems in this book are a wonderful mix of emotionally-packed texts and wisdom-laden pieces. Some poems gives a glimpse of life- Sometimes it's other people's lives, sometimes his life, and sometimes the reader's own.
Always, I saw pieces where the over-all theme is a search- a search for something that evades the seeker, be it a memory of the past, a sense of achievement or something that cannot be brought back.
More often than not, there's a 'hidden' message in the text- be it to live your life to the fullest NOW or the fact that pride sometimes entail not only selfishness but also selflessness in sacrifice.
Again, picking up this poetry book was indeed a spark of serendipity in my life. Now, I finally know who Dana Gioia is and believe me, next time I see a book of his in a secondhand bookshop, there'll be no hesitations in my part.
So... I delved in with no expectations whatsoever. All I can say is that, after reading, I thank my lucky stars I picked up this book randomly and decided to purchase it after a few moments of hesitation.
His poems in this book are a wonderful mix of emotionally-packed texts and wisdom-laden pieces. Some poems gives a glimpse of life- Sometimes it's other people's lives, sometimes his life, and sometimes the reader's own.
Always, I saw pieces where the over-all theme is a search- a search for something that evades the seeker, be it a memory of the past, a sense of achievement or something that cannot be brought back.
More often than not, there's a 'hidden' message in the text- be it to live your life to the fullest NOW or the fact that pride sometimes entail not only selfishness but also selflessness in sacrifice.
Again, picking up this poetry book was indeed a spark of serendipity in my life. Now, I finally know who Dana Gioia is and believe me, next time I see a book of his in a secondhand bookshop, there'll be no hesitations in my part.
June 17, 2014
English major, and I have a confession: I hate most poetry written in the last 100 years. I don't hate this. In fact, I think it's awesome. Savor it.
May 30, 2012
Because it's Dana Gioia, we expect more. First, the cover is badly done. Come on, it's Dana Gioia and it's from Graywolf. The design looks very amateurish to me, as if I was holding a book of a self-published author who just has his work produced with POD. Though the image (the amputated angel) on the cover echoes a poem in the book ("The Angel with the Broken Wing"), the overall stylistics is a fail. Then, the content. Most poems in Pity the Beautiful interrogate the function of God (or religion in general) in our world. But it has been done by lots of poets. Do we really need another book on this? However, there're other interesting approaches. In "Shopping", the speaker meditates upon the religious fetishes he sees in a department stores, where he can also shop for other household commodities. This juxtaposition is clever and potentially interesting. There are two very smart lines: "Because I would buy happiness if I could find it./ Spend all that I possessed or could borrow." Meanwhile, there are also very sentimental lines that weaken the piece (well, I think the poem is way too long. Cut the drama.): "Where are you, my errant soul and innermost companion?"
The strongest piece is definitely part I of "Special Treatment Wards" (which I have read in Poetry Mag). Each line shows control, each image is carefully chosen and effectively brings out the mood, not to mention most lines contain similar numbers of syllables, which makes the pace of the work flow smoothly. But this poem has outsmarted most of the remainders in the book. The weakest ones are those with rigid rhyme schemes. They read light and mediocre to me.
These are the clever lines I got from the book, though there aren't many:
"As if the only purpose of desire/ Were to express its infinite unfolding." (The Lunatic, The Lover, And the Poet")
"Symbols betray us./ They are always more or less than what/ Is really meant."
" Lovers swear loyalty in a careless world." (Autumn Inaugural")
Yes, that's all.
The strongest piece is definitely part I of "Special Treatment Wards" (which I have read in Poetry Mag). Each line shows control, each image is carefully chosen and effectively brings out the mood, not to mention most lines contain similar numbers of syllables, which makes the pace of the work flow smoothly. But this poem has outsmarted most of the remainders in the book. The weakest ones are those with rigid rhyme schemes. They read light and mediocre to me.
These are the clever lines I got from the book, though there aren't many:
"As if the only purpose of desire/ Were to express its infinite unfolding." (The Lunatic, The Lover, And the Poet")
"Symbols betray us./ They are always more or less than what/ Is really meant."
" Lovers swear loyalty in a careless world." (Autumn Inaugural")
Yes, that's all.
January 30, 2013
This is a beautiful collection with some truly extraordinary poems. I have been a fan of Gioia ever since encountering his verse for the first time. I love his dialog with form and forms as he works through rhyme and meter in a way most modern poets refuse to do, except to begin that way and then seek to turn it inside out, destroy it, underline the rhythm, the consistency.
There were many standouts for me in this collection: "Majority" is a beautiful, tragic poem reflecting on the loss of an infant son on what would have been his twenty-first birthday. "Autumn Inaugural" deals with Autumn (of course) and the return to school. "Reunion" speaks the hard truth of memory to the sentimental vision that often accompanies a reunion (of which group doesn't really matter here...). "Shopping" is a wise and clever send up of materialism. I'm not sure what "Prayer at Winter Solstice" is, other than bright, and beautiful, and excellent. "The Seven Deadly Sins" was quite clever and snarkily wise. "Special Treatments Ward" recognizes that their are no easy answers to suffering and loss. The answers that appear easy, are only "easy" because the person who finds them that way is disconnected from the event at hand in some fashion. "Pity The Beautiful" (the title track...), "Being Happy," and "The Apple Orchard" all differ widely except for the deep thought and consistent excellence they all display.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I'd only ever been able to read Gioia in tiny bits, a poem here, a poem there, always liking what I'd found. This (my first full collection) was a great pleasure, and wholly worth the effort.
There were many standouts for me in this collection: "Majority" is a beautiful, tragic poem reflecting on the loss of an infant son on what would have been his twenty-first birthday. "Autumn Inaugural" deals with Autumn (of course) and the return to school. "Reunion" speaks the hard truth of memory to the sentimental vision that often accompanies a reunion (of which group doesn't really matter here...). "Shopping" is a wise and clever send up of materialism. I'm not sure what "Prayer at Winter Solstice" is, other than bright, and beautiful, and excellent. "The Seven Deadly Sins" was quite clever and snarkily wise. "Special Treatments Ward" recognizes that their are no easy answers to suffering and loss. The answers that appear easy, are only "easy" because the person who finds them that way is disconnected from the event at hand in some fashion. "Pity The Beautiful" (the title track...), "Being Happy," and "The Apple Orchard" all differ widely except for the deep thought and consistent excellence they all display.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I'd only ever been able to read Gioia in tiny bits, a poem here, a poem there, always liking what I'd found. This (my first full collection) was a great pleasure, and wholly worth the effort.
August 14, 2012
I received my copy of the book through the FirstReads program.
Even though they say a poet is his own worst critic, that often appears not to be the case. Poetry as a genre is very easy to criticize. The formation, the metaphors, the context of each piece can either resound within a reader, or be rejected by them. Every poem's meaning is changed when another new reader absorbs the words. There is no one right answer.
That being said, the poems within Pity the Beautiful: Poems are certainly worthy of praise instead of critique. While the language is not necessarily flowery or complex, the images it creates are. But what astounds me more than the vocabulary of his work is the topics or subjects that Mr. Gioia depicts. They are simple objects, situations that normal human beings go through everyday, yet they are written of in such a way that you see them through brand new eyes. His work evokes a sense of discovery, wonder, curiosity, and remembrance.
Mr. Gioia's poems are of a quality I have not read in a while. The reader spends more time thinking about the poems than actually reading them, and in this humble reviewer's opinion, that is a trait of a successful poem. Any poetry enthusiast would love to have this small volume in their collection.
Even though they say a poet is his own worst critic, that often appears not to be the case. Poetry as a genre is very easy to criticize. The formation, the metaphors, the context of each piece can either resound within a reader, or be rejected by them. Every poem's meaning is changed when another new reader absorbs the words. There is no one right answer.
That being said, the poems within Pity the Beautiful: Poems are certainly worthy of praise instead of critique. While the language is not necessarily flowery or complex, the images it creates are. But what astounds me more than the vocabulary of his work is the topics or subjects that Mr. Gioia depicts. They are simple objects, situations that normal human beings go through everyday, yet they are written of in such a way that you see them through brand new eyes. His work evokes a sense of discovery, wonder, curiosity, and remembrance.
Mr. Gioia's poems are of a quality I have not read in a while. The reader spends more time thinking about the poems than actually reading them, and in this humble reviewer's opinion, that is a trait of a successful poem. Any poetry enthusiast would love to have this small volume in their collection.
August 2, 2012
The good poems were the translations. I have had such an unexpected visceral reaction to this collection. I expected so much more. I felt like I was reading work from a beginner's poetry workshop at the local community center.
May 30, 2021
Once, I heard Tyler Cowen converse with Dana Gioia and was blown away by the literary breadth and depth that was packed in his extraordinary brain. I set out to read his latest book only to discover that I had to wait for a physical book to show up since there was no Kindle version.
My patience was rewarded with a beautiful book whose cover was an illustration for one of my favourite poems within - “The Angel with the broken wing”. The titular composition “Pity the beautiful” is lovely and sad, a lyrical tribute to the ephemerality of what we consider classical beauty. I’m not sure I quite understood the finer nuances of the opera within, but I enjoyed the compositions in the first and fourth part very much. “The Road” rang true and the “Autumn Inaugural” was very clever. The finale on “Majority” moved me to tears. 💜
My patience was rewarded with a beautiful book whose cover was an illustration for one of my favourite poems within - “The Angel with the broken wing”. The titular composition “Pity the beautiful” is lovely and sad, a lyrical tribute to the ephemerality of what we consider classical beauty. I’m not sure I quite understood the finer nuances of the opera within, but I enjoyed the compositions in the first and fourth part very much. “The Road” rang true and the “Autumn Inaugural” was very clever. The finale on “Majority” moved me to tears. 💜
August 5, 2022
Favorite lines: “and vagrant sorrow cannot bless the dead.“ and “We thought we could create a life made only of peak moments.”
Most of these poems are not metrical and most do not rhyme. Other than the broken line they don’t much seem to be poetic. The narrator of these poems is lost in sorrow, but it does not seem that he did much to plan things or hold onto the best of them. He seems to be rather passive.
The centerpiece of this volume is a long poem called “Haunted”. The narrator visits a big house filled with various luxuries. He dismisses all of them as a jumble of gauche things. But he finds the wine cellar and grabs a couple of bottles. His girlfriend spends time talking about former lovers and they spat. They sleep in separate rooms, and it is then that he sees a ghost, who tells him “You don’t belong here.“ It is not moving.
Most of these poems are not metrical and most do not rhyme. Other than the broken line they don’t much seem to be poetic. The narrator of these poems is lost in sorrow, but it does not seem that he did much to plan things or hold onto the best of them. He seems to be rather passive.
The centerpiece of this volume is a long poem called “Haunted”. The narrator visits a big house filled with various luxuries. He dismisses all of them as a jumble of gauche things. But he finds the wine cellar and grabs a couple of bottles. His girlfriend spends time talking about former lovers and they spat. They sleep in separate rooms, and it is then that he sees a ghost, who tells him “You don’t belong here.“ It is not moving.
June 21, 2013
A TOP SHELF review, originally published in the June 13, 2013 edition of The Monitor
Imperfection as Our Native Speech
Poet Dana Gioia is a former chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts and noted proponent of the New Formalism that would rescue poetry from the remote hinterlands of ivory-tower academe and put it back in the people’s hands. Last year, Graywolf Press released his first new collection of verse in more than a decade, a slim but powerful volume infused with melancholy and hope.
The poems in Pity the Beautiful range from quick lyrical bits to longer narrative works and include translations of several works by Italian poets as well as extracts from a libretto. Standouts for me include “The Angel with the Broken Wing,” in which a scarred statue ponders its role as an “emblem of futility;” “Las Animas,” a translation of Mario Luzi’s poem in which a procession of lost souls makes its way through a burning landscape (a very moving día de los muertos reflection); “Autumn Inaugural,” a well-crafted apology for ritual and its key role in our lives; and the moving eulogy for children who’ve died in a hospital entitled “Special Treatments Ward.” Also amazing are the unconventional but wise ghost story “Haunted;” the selections from Tony Caruso’s Final Broadcast, an opera for which Gioia wrote the libretto, the story of a failed tenor whose late-night radio program is about to go off the air for good; and “Majority,” a heart-breaking piece written to commemorate what would have been the 21st birthday of the son Gioia lost in infancy.
Throughout Pity the Beautiful Gioia, whose background as a native Californian of Italian and Mexican descent has clearly made the symbols of Catholicism a versatile tool in his compositional kit, interweaves ghostly glimpses and hints of divinity with the faith-shattering realities of human existence. Amidst the intense juxtaposition of hope and doubt, his humor and compassion shine through warmly. Though clearly new formalist in his embracing of meter and rhyme, Gioia is willing to employ free verse where warranted, and elsewhere his rhythms spring naturally from the material while his rhymes are never trite, always organic. Technically accomplished, thematically relevant, lyrically beautiful, this collection is definitely top shelf.
Imperfection as Our Native Speech
Poet Dana Gioia is a former chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts and noted proponent of the New Formalism that would rescue poetry from the remote hinterlands of ivory-tower academe and put it back in the people’s hands. Last year, Graywolf Press released his first new collection of verse in more than a decade, a slim but powerful volume infused with melancholy and hope.
The poems in Pity the Beautiful range from quick lyrical bits to longer narrative works and include translations of several works by Italian poets as well as extracts from a libretto. Standouts for me include “The Angel with the Broken Wing,” in which a scarred statue ponders its role as an “emblem of futility;” “Las Animas,” a translation of Mario Luzi’s poem in which a procession of lost souls makes its way through a burning landscape (a very moving día de los muertos reflection); “Autumn Inaugural,” a well-crafted apology for ritual and its key role in our lives; and the moving eulogy for children who’ve died in a hospital entitled “Special Treatments Ward.” Also amazing are the unconventional but wise ghost story “Haunted;” the selections from Tony Caruso’s Final Broadcast, an opera for which Gioia wrote the libretto, the story of a failed tenor whose late-night radio program is about to go off the air for good; and “Majority,” a heart-breaking piece written to commemorate what would have been the 21st birthday of the son Gioia lost in infancy.
Throughout Pity the Beautiful Gioia, whose background as a native Californian of Italian and Mexican descent has clearly made the symbols of Catholicism a versatile tool in his compositional kit, interweaves ghostly glimpses and hints of divinity with the faith-shattering realities of human existence. Amidst the intense juxtaposition of hope and doubt, his humor and compassion shine through warmly. Though clearly new formalist in his embracing of meter and rhyme, Gioia is willing to employ free verse where warranted, and elsewhere his rhythms spring naturally from the material while his rhymes are never trite, always organic. Technically accomplished, thematically relevant, lyrically beautiful, this collection is definitely top shelf.
December 27, 2016
A favorite:
AUTUMN INAUGURAL
There will always be those who reject ceremony,
Who claim that resolution requires no fanfare,
Those who demand the spirit stay fixed
Like a desert saint, fed only on faith,
To worship in no temple but the weather.
There will always be the austere ones
Who mount denial's shaky ladder
To drape the statues or whitewash the frescoed wall,
As if the still star of painted plaster
Praised creation less than the evening's original.
And they are right. Symbols betray us.
They are always more or less than what
Is really meant. But shall there be no
Processions by torchlight because we are weak?
What native speech do we share but imperfection?
Praise to the rituals that celebrate change,
Old robes worn for new beginnings,
Solemn protocol where the mutable soul,
Surrounded by ancient experience, grows
Young in the imagination's white dress.
Because it is not the rituals we honor
But our trust in what they signify, these rites
That honor us as witnesses - whether to watch
Lovers swear loyalty in a careless world
Or a newborn washed with water and oil.
So praise to innocence - impulsive and evergreen -
And let the old be touched by youth's
Wayward astonishment at learning something new,
And dream of a future so fitting and so just
That our desire will bring it into being.
(Dana Gioia, Pity the Beautiful: Poems, Minneapolis, Minnesota: Graywolf Press, 2012, pp. 27-8)
AUTUMN INAUGURAL
I.
There will always be those who reject ceremony,
Who claim that resolution requires no fanfare,
Those who demand the spirit stay fixed
Like a desert saint, fed only on faith,
To worship in no temple but the weather.
There will always be the austere ones
Who mount denial's shaky ladder
To drape the statues or whitewash the frescoed wall,
As if the still star of painted plaster
Praised creation less than the evening's original.
And they are right. Symbols betray us.
They are always more or less than what
Is really meant. But shall there be no
Processions by torchlight because we are weak?
What native speech do we share but imperfection?
II.
Praise to the rituals that celebrate change,
Old robes worn for new beginnings,
Solemn protocol where the mutable soul,
Surrounded by ancient experience, grows
Young in the imagination's white dress.
Because it is not the rituals we honor
But our trust in what they signify, these rites
That honor us as witnesses - whether to watch
Lovers swear loyalty in a careless world
Or a newborn washed with water and oil.
So praise to innocence - impulsive and evergreen -
And let the old be touched by youth's
Wayward astonishment at learning something new,
And dream of a future so fitting and so just
That our desire will bring it into being.
(Dana Gioia, Pity the Beautiful: Poems, Minneapolis, Minnesota: Graywolf Press, 2012, pp. 27-8)
June 15, 2012
I have read more poetry recently--the rich lines of Tomas Transtormer, Christian Wiman, and Scott Cairns have given much thoughtful pleasure. But I find myself most taken by Dan Gioia's recent poetry, "Pity the Beautiful." Perhaps it is because we are nearly the same age, but reading poems like "Reunion" or "The Road" seemed as if the poet had heard the utterances of my heart and had placed them in sensical order. I am not a poetry expert or critic--I read poetry because I love words that connect my eye and ear and heart with my mind. This volume did it for me.
May 15, 2022
I’m familiar with the author, but have never carefully read through a collection of his poetry. This is a lovely collection of poems. I especially liked “Shopping” and “Pity the Beautiful” and would have loved another ten pages of “Haunted,” but I agree with the other reviewers that some of the religiously-themed poems feel a bit trite—not feigned or insincere though—and that the truly exceptional poem in this collection is “Autumn Inaugural.” It’s near perfection. I’m encouraged to read more.
July 26, 2014
Really enjoyed this collection overall, especially his poem "Autumnal Inauguration," on the power of symbolism and ritual and faith. Some poems left me cold, not because they weren't quality poems, but I just didn't resonate with them, especially some of the "lighter" poems that I think others will enjoy, but overall, the poetry in this book is strong.
July 6, 2012
Loved these poems! I related to so many of them, and they had such contemporary themes. Some of my favorites were: The Argument, Pity the Beautiful, and Reunion. I cannot wait to read more by this Author! I am very thankful to have won this book in a Goodreads Giveaway!
July 31, 2012
Lovely, classically written poetry, Gioia writes of love, of the death of an infant son, and of past loves. All are portrayed with exquisite language that makes you wish you'd been a past love of his just so that he'd have written a great poem about you.
August 9, 2012
Gioia has done a lot for the arts in America, and for that I consider him a saint. However, this is the first book of his poetry I've read, and I can't say I'm itching for more. Enjoyed a few.
May 8, 2014
Gioia's work is remarkably beautiful. Often the commonplace masks the beauty of his words. But he constantly amazes.
December 20, 2018
I had two favorites in this collection. I liked "The Road", which starts with this punch in the gut "He sometimes felt that he had missed his life / By being far too busy looking for it."
I also liked one called "The Freeways Considered as Earth Gods," which uses the conceit that California's freeways are "gods who rule this golden land" which was both witty and powerful.
I've heard Gioia read aloud from his poetry twice (he's the poet laureate of the state where I live, California). I was not a poetry fan before seeing him speak, so I feel like he really turned on a light inside my head or inside my heart that shone on the idea of poetry being something that could provide some additional meaning to life.
I also liked one called "The Freeways Considered as Earth Gods," which uses the conceit that California's freeways are "gods who rule this golden land" which was both witty and powerful.
I've heard Gioia read aloud from his poetry twice (he's the poet laureate of the state where I live, California). I was not a poetry fan before seeing him speak, so I feel like he really turned on a light inside my head or inside my heart that shone on the idea of poetry being something that could provide some additional meaning to life.
June 13, 2023
This collection reminded me of Billy Collins’ “Nine Horses” in both tone and glance, as it is a highly reflective long look — taken during the beginning of the golden hour years — at those ephemeral things which promised, at one time, contain the infinite. But Gioia, unlike Collins, seems able to gesture towards the truly infinite things in his reflections, yet in a way that mostly prevents the reader from latching into them too quickly. A favorite few lines:
O Lord of indirection and ellipses,
ignore our prayers. Deliver us from distraction.
Slow our heartbeat to a cricket’s call.
O Lord of indirection and ellipses,
ignore our prayers. Deliver us from distraction.
Slow our heartbeat to a cricket’s call.
August 9, 2017
Such depth and perception with mere words. His poetry has become an obsession in recent months. He has a way of bringing comfort on days that are grey. He shares quite nicely with friends for the same reason.
The walls come down and one sees goodness, and generous spirit from him and onto others that are in your thoughts at the time. Poetry opens doors to beauty we need in our lives.
The walls come down and one sees goodness, and generous spirit from him and onto others that are in your thoughts at the time. Poetry opens doors to beauty we need in our lives.
February 20, 2023
This book was supposed to last about a month, reading one poem a day. Instead, I’ve read it in 3 days, but I don’t mind. The poems will stand up to a re-read.
Gioia is a rare modern poet, reflective but not self-obsessed. Also, his rhyme and meter makes so much sense to me. My favorites from the book are The Angel With the Broken Wing, Prophecy, and Majority.
Gioia is a rare modern poet, reflective but not self-obsessed. Also, his rhyme and meter makes so much sense to me. My favorites from the book are The Angel With the Broken Wing, Prophecy, and Majority.
July 13, 2022
Good poetry. Metered, usually iambic pentameter, with modern themes. I'm memorizing two poems from the book- The Freeways Considered As Earth Gods and the one about the dying children's hospital ward.
May 9, 2017
Beautiful, heartbreaking, dimension expanding... master of language and emotions....
March 8, 2022
Favorites: "The Angel with the Broken Wing," "Prayer at Winter Solstice," "Freeways Considered as Earth Gods," "The Argument," "Autumn Inaugural," "The Seven Deadly Sins."
May 6, 2022
Beautiful
October 18, 2022
Often with poetry I fear I am missing something.
I enjoyed the frankness and humanness of many lines in this, but overall was not drawn in.
The first poem, The Present, was my favorite.
I enjoyed the frankness and humanness of many lines in this, but overall was not drawn in.
The first poem, The Present, was my favorite.
October 30, 2025
A solid collection of poetry. I especially enjoyed The Freeway Considered as Earth Gods. I honestly could not tell that the author was a man which I think is a compliment.
July 11, 2012
I have always admired Dana Gioia's fidelity to form. To me, the sometimes confining strictures of form is like an ascetic finding beauty among the rote routines of his/her life. Unfortunately, Gioia's least successful poems are the religious imagery ones where phrases such as "Life has its mysteries, annunciations/and some must where a crown of thorns...(Prophecy)" seem shopworn and uninspired. Other phrases such as "achingly real,"pressing crowds,"the winds of dawn expire," "ghost of a chance," "My father breaks my heart," and many others which are either cliches or the type of banal sentiments found in mass-produced Hallmark cards. Despite these disappointments from a poet I admire, there are some genuine poems that one feels privileged to read. Interestingly, its when Gioia doesn't try to cavort with the Gods or try to aim for the canon with the big themes that he simply stuns the reader with his powerful writing. For example, the last poem, 'Majority," where the entire poems reads as the following: "Now you'd be three,/I said to myself, seeing a child born/the same summer as you.// Now you'd be six,/or seven, or ten./I watched you grow/in foreign bodies.// Leaping into a pool, all laughter/or frowning over a keyboard,/but mostly just standing,/taller each time.// How splendid your most/mundane action seemed/in these joyful proxies./I often held back tears.// Now you are twenty-one./Finally, it makes sense/that you have moved away/into your own afterlife." "Special Treatment Ward" starts off "So this where the children come to die/" and remains harrowing and unsentimental throughout before ending with "And vagrant sorrow cannot bless the dead." Its always an event when Mr. Gioia publishes since he is usually a meticulous, patient poet, but because the expectations are so high I feel somewhat let down by this collection, despite the obvious gifts and talent he displays.
July 5, 2012
The strongest poem in this collection is "Majority." Poems like "The Angel with Broken Wings," and, "Finding a Box of of Family Letters," are memorable.
I don't want to spoil the collection behind what I think the major "motifs" are, but I'll say that the strongest poems in this collections deals with phantoms of the past because there is, for the majority of the time, a held back tone in the poems -- as though to keep the subject matter together from imploding or exploding.
Yet, "Haunted" -- the long narrative poem -- which, I feel, comes across as the crux of the collection falls a little short for me -- a little bit superficial, and the tone of the speaker doesn't fit quite right for me when placed among the collection.
I'd recommend it if you like poets like Robert Frost or James Wright.
I don't want to spoil the collection behind what I think the major "motifs" are, but I'll say that the strongest poems in this collections deals with phantoms of the past because there is, for the majority of the time, a held back tone in the poems -- as though to keep the subject matter together from imploding or exploding.
Yet, "Haunted" -- the long narrative poem -- which, I feel, comes across as the crux of the collection falls a little short for me -- a little bit superficial, and the tone of the speaker doesn't fit quite right for me when placed among the collection.
I'd recommend it if you like poets like Robert Frost or James Wright.
May 10, 2013
Gioia tends to overuse repetition in some poems and it really effects the overall flow of the collection.
"The Seven Deadly Sins," was my favorite because it personifies pride, lust, gluttony et al having a mad party of sorts.
The collection is very short and many poems lament loss and past relationships. "Haunted" is a longer narrative poem that really left me wondering why I read an eight page poem. That isn't too long for a poem, but I was waiting to be captivated or drawn to something, but this poem really did not have any startling elements. Technique and interesting content were both missing. There are a number of good lyrical poems such as title piece "Pity the Beautiful" and "The Coat." Other poems in the collection seem to lack imagery, striking lines, and word choice is often awkward. There are so many articles and conjunctions! This collection is worth browsing.
"The Seven Deadly Sins," was my favorite because it personifies pride, lust, gluttony et al having a mad party of sorts.
The collection is very short and many poems lament loss and past relationships. "Haunted" is a longer narrative poem that really left me wondering why I read an eight page poem. That isn't too long for a poem, but I was waiting to be captivated or drawn to something, but this poem really did not have any startling elements. Technique and interesting content were both missing. There are a number of good lyrical poems such as title piece "Pity the Beautiful" and "The Coat." Other poems in the collection seem to lack imagery, striking lines, and word choice is often awkward. There are so many articles and conjunctions! This collection is worth browsing.
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