I Love Hearing Your Dreams: Poems

by Matthew Zapruder

From one of contemporary poetry's most playful and original minds, an enchanting and harrowing journey through the landscape of dreams and twenty-first century disillusions.“Your dreams have no hidden agenda to be wise they are made to be forgotten so something can be known” I Love Hearing Your Dreams is a book of reveries, of failed elegies, of “the last time that things were real” and the moments that come afterward. These are dream songs for an age of insomnia, where the poet is always awake “at that oddest hour / that does not end, / the crooked, unnumbered one” and the future seems to be “just the past in a suit / that will never be in style.” Yet dreams in Matthew Zapruder’s poems are also a place of possibility, of reality envisioned anew—sleep shows us not merely what the world is, but what it could be. From a poet celebrated for his “razor eye for the remnants and revenants of modern culture” (The New York Times), I Love Hearing Your Dreams is a startlingly beautiful and deeply vulnerable book where lives journey into a mystifying place and emerge transformed.

Genres: Poetry, Adult, Audiobook

128 pages, Hardcover

Published September 24, 2024

About the author

Matthew Zapruder is the author of five collections of poetry, most recently Father’s Day, as well as Why Poetry, and Story of a Poem. In 2000, he co-founded Verse Press, and is now editor at large at Wave Books, where he edits contemporary poetry, prose, and translations. From 2016-7 he held the annually rotating position of Editor of the Poetry Column for the New York Times Magazine, and he was the Editor of Best American Poetry 2022. He lives in Northern California, and teaches in the MFA in Creative Writing at Saint Mary’s College of California. His forthcoming collection of poetry, I Love Hearing Your Dreams, will be published by Scribner in September, 2024.

Reviews

[Christine Hall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poem for Matthew Zapruder
★★★★★

I love reading your poems
the book jacket with the bunny
from my favorite childhood book

the way the little green leaf
drifted down into your home
and your heart

about your dreams
your son
your sunflowers

[Michelle Graf · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to NetGalley and Scribner for the ARC.

A stunning cover for an okay poetry collection. Most of the poems carry a hefty amount of nostalgia, a longing for the comfort of the past, even when those memories start to get hazy with time. Some do it well, but it starts to get monotonous after a while.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a style of poetry I typically connect with, but I found some gems to treasure and reread regardless.

Big thanks to Scribner for the advance copy.

[Hannah · Rating 2 out of 5]

not for me

[Mae B · Rating 2 out of 5]

This collection wasn’t for me. It leaned more towards observational poetry without any underlying theme. If that’s your thing give it a try. I found it difficult to remain invested.

Thanks to NetGalley and the Publisher for the arc.

[Kendra Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read poetry in the mornings. There's something about the liminal space of morning time that leaves me open to the meandering meanings and the amorphous nature of poetry.

I Love Hearing Your Dreams tugged on my imagination more than most books of poems I've read recently. Poems often hit me with big feels. But Zapruder's collection left me wondering about the meaning of the poems, turning them over, with a vague notion that if I read them at a different time, they might mean something else to me entirely.

I loved this book precisely because I didn't always "get" the poems. Not in that way that can leave me feeling daft, but more akin to my soul being gently, delicately pried open to allow specific phrases and images to catch. I like to think those fragments are working on me, like sand in an oyster. There are pearls there, I'm sure. But I may have to re-read I Love Hearing Your Dreams to access all of the wonder & meaning packed into this little book.

Order I Love Hearing Your Dreams here & support Bookish Atlanta: https://bookshop.org/a/4334/978166805...

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I Love Hearing Your Dreams: Poems embody the blip of time between wakefulness and sleep, where you reconcile the day's experiences and settle into what you wish to bring into your dreams. These poems evoke nostalgia for simpler times, words as comforts of familiar moments. They are both observational and quietly beautiful.

Thank you to Scribner Poetry for a finished copy of I Love Hearing Your Dreams: Poems.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

First book finished in 2025 and the first I've read by Matthew Zapruder, whose work NPR describes as "poems for everyone, everywhere, insisting that everything is subject for poetry, and that all language is poetic language, democratic in its insights and feelings.”

I agree. This is an enjoyable, approachable collection of poetry blending themes of a nostalgic past merging into the present: A grandmother's dictionary, the snow globes his father brought home for his mother from every business trip, a father soothing a feverish son, Zoom meetings during the pandemic. There are lines relatable to every writer -- the scribbled thoughts in the middle of the night that are indecipherable by day -- and odes to poets who have left us, such as Gerald Stern.

"And you will never drive again / Along some river with too many / consonants in its name /
it will keep flowing / north like the Nile...."

(Has to be Pittsburgh's own Monongahela, right?)

And lastly, the title and that dreamlike cover, the latter of which "is from a book many of you read in childhood The Country Bunny and the Little Gold Shoes" Zapruder writes on his Substack. Indeed, these poems feel dreamlike, the mood sometimes hazy. (“Your dreams / have no hidden / agenda to be wise / they are made / to be forgotten / so something / can be known”)
Perhaps this is a theme that Zapruder has been thinking about for awhile. In March 2016, he was named the poetry editor for The New York Times Magazine. "For most of my life as a poet," Zapruder said in an interview, "I have been thinking about this very moment, when a poem enters into someone’s life. Most of the time, this happens in expected situations: a classroom, a wedding, a funeral. Maybe we have even chosen to pick up a book of them. But I believe that poems are meant to be a part of our lives. They are made up of our language, reconfigured and rearranged to make our minds move in different directions than they ordinarily would. At their best, they make something close to a waking dream."

The publisher's description, too: "'These are dream songs for an age of insomnia, where the poet is always awake “at that oddest hour / that does not end, / the crooked, unnumbered one” and the future seems to be “just the past in a suit / that will never be in style.' Yet dreams in Matthew Zapruder’s poems are also a place of possibility, of reality envisioned anew—sleep shows us not merely what the world is, but what it could be."

Don't sleep on this one.

[Brice Montgomery · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to NetGalley and Scribner for the ARC!

Matthew Zapruder’s I Love Hearing Your Dreams is a warm, insulated collection of poems, often feeling like a shield between the reader and the world.

Many of these poems feel like the parts of bedtime stories that gnaw at the edges of dreams—the final sentences one hears before falling asleep. In other words, the cover offers a great picture of what readers can expect. These pieces surround readers like a blanket, muting the chaos of life when it occasionally breaks in.

Even the pieces with titles like “Supreme Despair Song” carry a certain kind of quietude. In that particular case, it’s immediately followed by a poem about yogurt. It’s so common for poetic turns to feel like a twist of the knife—it’s a nice alternative to see some that feel like rolling over in bed.

Unfortunately, the velvet-lined dreamscape Zapruder weaves here is often so smooth as to be frictionless. Many of the poems land the same way it does when someone shares a dream over breakfast—“Hm, I wonder if that means anything”—a momentary interruption before thinking about the day ahead or the toast that’s burning or almost anything else. Furthermore, some of these pieces seem to have been written during the height of the COVID pandemic, such as “The Evening Meeting,” and poems about Zoom calls feel like unpleasant relics at this point.

Thankfully, the collection ends strong. “Failed Elegy” is one of the most gorgeous poems I’ve read in a while, and it acts as an argument for the form’s limitations, suggesting that there are better places to be than the heart of a poem. It is such a succinct picture of the book’s guiding principle, and I wish it were one of the first pieces in the book so that it would frame everything else accordingly.

All in all, I Love Hearing Your Dreams feels like the perfect book to spend an afternoon and a cup of tea with, and I think it will reward readers who seek the comfort of poems that create room for them.

[lesley · Rating 3 out of 5]

My thanks to Net Galley for the digital ARC.

I was initially intrigued by the sweet cover--an anthropomorphized rabbit in a dress and shawl walking through a dark forest--and may have expected poems to match. They were not about little woodland creatures, but there were some excellent and tender ideas gathered here.

This short book includes poems about:
Sunflowers
Birds
Poetry and poets
How much the poet loves his wife and son
The pandemic
The poet's high school French class (this is actually one of my favorites)
Death
A zoom meeting

I did also feel a sort of kinship with the poet, who lived in my city during the pandemic--there's something so relatable about getting burritos at the apocalypse. I also liked how grounded many of the poems were in appreciation for his life.

There were a few lines that really stood out which I'll add here once the book is published.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Matthew Zapruder's I Love Hearing Your Dreams: Poems is a collection of diverse poems. I thoroughly enjoyed reading many of the poems in this book. It is true that some of the poems didn't appeal to me, but you will find that in any collection of poetry. He definitely conveys mental imagery in his poems and draws his readers in. The cover wasn't my favorite. It didn't fit with the book's content. The following are a few of the poems that I particularly enjoyed.

I Love Hearing Your Dreams

My Grandmother's Dictionary

Thoughts on Punctuation

Bad Bear

Tell Me Why

The Locksmith

Jury Duty

King Oak

Dear Pink Flower

Sunflower Poem

Sundays

I See You

Listening to Paintings

I Don't Know

[Kristina Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

If I ever stop crying from the sheer beauty of this collection, I'll start planning how to share these masterfully crafted pieces of art with my students. "Poem for Rupi Kaur" and "For Yount Poets" are the perfect introductions to responding to poetry, and I truly believe my students will understand that with this collection, they don't have to "get" poetry, because the poems already understand them.

"Bad Bear" and "Failed Elegy" were personal favorites. It's hard to explain why, but I felt like an old friend had called and I was listening to their voicemail, reminding me they didn't mind if I never picked up the phone.


***Thank you to NetGalley and to the publisher for providing me with a digital copy of this book to review.***

[Keith Dugan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Strong 3.5 to light 4. I wish I could remember more about this collection of poems - my first experience of Zapruder’s work, beyond an existential and collective unconscious dread underpinning almost every poem here. A lot of moments hit me hard specifically, why can’t I recall them? Either way, despite a syntax that took a while for me to get used to in terms of taking me out of the flow of reading, his story telling and vignette building is special, and dream-like. Each stanza fights on its own well enough but when you step back to look at the whole thing, each stanza is like a brushstroke in a painting, forming the structure and shape.

Intend to re-read and re-review.

[Andy Oram · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has a very personal and very engaging style. The pacing is like everyday speech—although stretching sentences far past their normal limits—and the poems can be read fast and glibly. But Zapruder manages to take us on beautiful lyrical excursions, for instance "entranced as he crafted / tensile sentences / out of the air" and "under sinister chimneys wraiths /of knowledge walk toward the door."

These poems offer themes of loss: loss of people, places, times in the author's past, and the wellness of the whole world ("It seems these days / every poem is a failed elegy / for the world").

[Janereads10 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to Simon & Schuster, for the free copy for review.

Every now and then, I take a break from novels and stumble upon a treasure trove of poetry. The poems in this book are a contemplative mix, each offering a unique perspective—some laced with humor, others tinged with somber reflections, and all imbued with a sense of hope. Listening to the author read these poems elevates the experience, adding a personal and intimate touch that resonates deeply. This is a collection I see myself returning to, eager to re-read.

[Jenn Renee · Rating 3 out of 5]

It has been a long time since I read a poetry book. This book, “I Love Hearing Your Dreams” has a variety of poems that caused different emotions for me. Some poems were fantastic and created amazing imagery. Other poems I felt almost nothing about as the words didn’t form an image or story in my mind. This is an interesting take on modern poetry outside of the well known poets. Some of these poems could easily be used in a poetry class to teach students about imagery. Overall a decent book.

[Linda Grana · Rating 4 out of 5]

I consider myself a fairly avid reader of contemporary poetry, and have read a few of Matthew Zapruder's collections. Though I enjoyed every one of them, his most recent "I Love Hearing Your Dreams", due out in September has become my favorite.
From the moment I first spotted it, the title itself, drew me right in. And the cover–it is by far one of the most outstanding and appealing covers I've encountered on any book of poetry. Fantastical and 'dreamy'!
Aside from that, I thoroughly enjoyed the numerous references to dreams, some good, some bad; as well as the realities, memories and reflections. This is definitely a book that will stay with me, and one that I will want to add to my personal library. Not only so I can pull it out periodically to delight in its adorable cover once again, but to review those poems in there that I've marked as my favorites.
Thanks to NetGalley and Scribner for the advance readers copy!

[Katie]

I really enjoyed this poetry collection! I know Matthew Zapruder from my days at SMC, and while I never did take a class with him, I always looked up to him a lot as a poet. There were so many poems I loved here—“Thoughts on Punctuation”, “Bad Bear”, “Poem for a Suicide”, “For Young Poets”, “Sunflower Poem”, “Trains in Japan”, “The Blues Band”, “Listening to Paintings”, “Failed Elegy”. I feel inspired to get back into poetry again.

[Kyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an enjoyable read. Zapruder's word choices created a smooth pacing of words pushing to the next words creating beautiful mental imagery. One nice feature of this collection is each poem is it's on piece thematically, creating a nice varied journey.

[Jessica Mchale · Rating 4 out of 5]

The cover is delightful, for some reason it reminded me of reading goodnight moon to my son. So, the nostalgia the cover made me feel is why I checked this book out of the library. I am enjoying the poems , some I could read over and over again.

[Jessi Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

A few of the poems were slightly confusing but I liked the overall aspect of the poems pertaining to impermanence and forgetting and death. It's just like a dream - never lasts, you often times forget what it was even about, and it's like another life that has died when you wake up.

[Ann Straight · Rating 3 out of 5]

I try to read poems in hope of understanding; sometimes it is true that i do. when poems are about nature or death, i guess I hear what is said. Sunflowers? not sure , is there a metaphor? I like alliteration and the words spoken outloud certainly. Yet poetry leaves me so unsure.

[Kaitlyn Whitten · Rating 3 out of 5]

3🌟

There certainly is some beauty within these pages, just not quite the type for me. Sometimes it felt like a rant or writing prompt moment, or a disjointed journal. It was good, just not the type of poetry I usually go for and enjoy.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful book

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Probably like a 3.5. Review to come.

[Travisimo5 · Rating 2 out of 5]

I failed
To connect
With these
Short lines
Too much
Pause
It’s not
For me

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good images, clever syntactical choices— just not for me. The feeling behind it didn’t connect, felt like a poetry exercise. But I’m sure for many it was resonant.

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Washington Post’s Book Club newsletter by Ron Charles always includes a poem. One week it was by Matthew Zapruder and I liked it so much that I bought his book.

[C · Rating 3 out of 5]

Inconsistent with some lovely moments (and great cover!). The language is fairly loose and cut into chronically short lines, which made it difficult to hold onto.

[Brett · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s so easy to do nothing
except lament our success

at writing useless laments.