Once, Then

by Andrea Scarpino

In her debut full-length poetry collection, Andrea Scarpino’s elegies move between personal and political loss, between science, myth, and spirituality, and between lyric intensity and narrative clarity. At their heart is a longing for those we have lost, and an acknowledgement that loss irrevocably changes us and what we understand of the world. Blending mythological figures such as Persephone and Achilles, scientific approaches to knowledge learned from her microbiologist father, and a deep ambivalence regarding religious ideas of death and afterlife, Scarpino’s poems invite us to examine the world, our own place in it, and what to make of its continual collapse.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2014

About the author

Andrea Scarpino is co-editor of the anthology Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice (MSU Press, 2019) and the author of the poetry collections Once Upon Wing Lake (Four Chambers Press, 2017), What the Willow Said as it Fell (Red Hen Press, 2016) and Once, Then (Red Hen Press, 2014), and the chapbook The Grove Behind (Finishing Line Press). She received a PhD in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University, and an MFA from The Ohio State University. She has published in numerous journals including The Cincinnati Review, Los Angeles Review, and Prairie Schooner, and she served as Poet Laureate of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula 2015-2017.

Reviews

[Matthew Gavin Frank · Rating 5 out of 5]

Profound, heartbreaking, life-affirming, and downright beautiful, Once, Then reminds us of poetry's desire to undo us with the lyrically- rendered reminder of the very denominators that unite us. A stunning work.

[Amy Harth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Inspiring. Andrea demonstrates the depth of love and its importance.

[Kayla Boss · Rating 5 out of 5]

if you’re looking for some beautiful poetry written from the heart of a beautiful person, look no further! Once, Then is a really wonderful collection of poems centered mostly on grief, loss, and faith. they will break your heart, affirm your own experiences, trouble you, and lift you up. 10/10 recommend 💕

[Elizabeth Birr · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a heavy-topic book of poetry. She writes frequently of her dad’s death and they’re heartbreaking but beautiful. The Hiroshima poem is also devastating - I particularly love how she took pieces of the poem to make the last section.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautiful beautiful beautiful collection. I published a couple of these poems several years ago when I was poetry editor of the Southern California Review, and I'm so glad to see how many more amazing poems Andrea has in her. I'm looking forward to following her career for a very long time.

[Pam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing. Moving. Thoughtful. Thought provoking. Wonderful.