Stranger

by Emily Hunt

Stranger, Emily Hunt's long-awaited follow-up to her acclaimed debut collection of poems, intimately chronicles the effects of love, labor, and grief on the life and sensibility of an artist. These poems shed a shifting light on the peculiar textures of our era. Hunt treads with concision, vigor, and excitement, addressing directly lived experiences––from the mundane to the profound. Whether it’s her curious interactions with dating apps, 19th century political speeches, dizzying corporate communication, or emails from her schizophrenic brother, the exact details and use of language in these poems become almost elemental, making an urgent record of the present. Stranger blurs the boundary between life and art—“The things that happened / bled into the language we exchanged.”—with the crystalline touch and nuance of a truly gifted writer.

Genres: Poetry

116 pages, Paperback

Published March 1, 2024

About the author

Emily Hunt’s works include the poetry collection Dark Green (The Song Cave, 2015); Cousins (Cold Cube Press, 2019), a photography book; New Clouds (Floating Wolf Quarterly, 2013), a poetry chapbook; and This Always Happens (Brave Men Press, 2013), a book of drawings and text. She lives in New York City. See more at emilyrhunt.org and on Instagram @its_ehu.

Reviews

[Emma Raddatz · Rating 4 out of 5]

“I dream of taking the baby out of the house.
Waking up, she registers
the edges of her crib
and the mobile above.
Her eyes like new leaves.”

Beautiful.

[Travis Klunick · Rating 5 out of 5]

fucking sad

[S P · Rating 3 out of 5]

Doritos
In 1937, Simone Weil experienced
ecstasy in an ugly church.

At 34, she was weak,
hungry, impossibly

bold, dead by '43.
Weil was really into the word

supernatural. She circles around it.
The ideas she is building

come back to it.
It ends many sentences

containing her
so she gives it a life.

Man’s great affliction
which begins with infancy

and accompanies him
till death, is that looking

and eating are two different
operations. Eternal

beatitude is a state
where to look is to eat.

My chip was invented
after her time.

Man only escapes
from the laws of the world

in lightning flashes.
It is through such instants

that he is capable
of the supernatural.

I’ve watched a cat
eat a Dorito in grass,

have eaten whole bags
by the black sea.

They are plain, thin,
fried, dry

corn until they’re covered
in bright powder.

Salt, cheddar cheese,
maltrodextrin, whey,

monosodium glutamate,
buttermilk solids, romano,

whey protein concentrate,
onion powder, partially

hydrogenated soybean
and cottonseed oil,

corn flour, disodium
phosphate, lactose, natural

and artificial flavor, dextrose,
tomato powder, spices, lactic

acid, Yellow 6, Yellow 5,
Red 40, citric acid, sugar,

garlic powder, sodium,
caseinate, disodium inosinate,

disodium guanylate, nonfat
milk solids, whey protein,

isolate, corn syrup,
but I want more of them.

Contradiction is the point of the pyramid.
Doradito means “little golden thing.”

[Devin Boe · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's rare that I read a book of poetry I one or two sittings. Despite it's profundity, it was easy to devour this whole book. Tragic and quietly raw, it is a stunning work of modern biographical poetry.

[Victor Dorobantu · Rating 1 out of 5]

I really kept wishing I’d like it more. Very few of the poems made me feel anything. Reading the end notes, I realized I had completely forgotten many of the poems from only (maybe) two weeks before.

[anon · Rating 4 out of 5]

amazing amazing. would give it a 5 but fell off for me a bit second half. but "Company" rlly blew my mind