Decades: Selected Poems

by Joseph Massey

Genres: Poetry

252 pages, Paperback

Published March 26, 2024

About the author

Joseph Massey is the author of A New Silence (forthcoming from Shearsman Books), Illocality (Wave Books, 2015) and a trilogy grounded in the landscape of coastal Humboldt County, California: Areas of Fog (Shearsman Books, 2009), At the Point (Shearsman Books, 2011), and To Keep Time (Omnidawn, 2014).

His chapbooks include Minima St. (Range, 2003), Eureka Slough (Effing Press, 2005), Bramble (Hot Whiskey, 2005), Property Line (Fewer & Further, 2006), Out of Light (Kitchen Press, 2008), Within Hours (Fault Line Press, 2008), The Lack Of (Nasturtium Press, 2009), Exit North (Book Thug, 2010), Thaw Compass (Press Board Press, 2014), An Interim (Tungsten Press, 2014), What Follows (Ornithopter Press, 2015), Present Conditions (Hollyridge Press) and 5 Poems (Tungsten Press, 2018).

His work has appeared in many journals and magazines, including The Nation, A Public Space, American Poet: The Journal of the Academy of American Poets, Verse, GeoHumanities, Talisman, and in

anthologies: Visiting Dr. Williams: Poems Inspired by the Life and Work of William Carlos Williams (University of Iowa Press, 2011), Haiku in English: The First Hundred Years (W.W. Norton & Company, 2013), Please Excuse This Poem: 100 New Poems for the Next Generation (Viking Penguin, 2015), The Poem Is You: 60 Contemporary American Poems and How to Read Them (Belknap Press, 2016), and Renga for Obama (Harvard University Press, 2018).

He worked as an instructor and teaching assistant for the University of Pennsylvania’s ModPo (Modern and Contemporary Poetry) MOOC, which serves thousands of students, worldwide, at no cost. He now teaches privately.

He lives in the Pioneer Valley of Massachusetts.

Reviews

[silas denver melvin · Rating 3 out of 5]

a high three

[Dawn Paoletta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Massey is both economical and specific in his word use-he whittles all down to the barest, sharpest imagery. This is my second poetry collection read from him and I am officially a devotee to his work now.
His words are a marriage of brevity and clarity birthing beauty. This book covers selections from seven of his other published collections.
So very, very, good!

[Claire · Rating 5 out of 5]

Spectacular. I've read several other poetry collections by more well-known modern poets recently, but none of them at all touched the craft and musicality of this, especially the second half with exerpts from his more recent books, where a much deeper skill and achievement are evident. There's something incredibly satisfying about tracking his development through this book as he moves from a merely excellent/gifted poet to a master of the art, with words that steadily deepen and deepen (I especially enjoyed as his poetry moved from mainly observational - he's an observer of the daily details of life - highways, traffic, birds, insects, trees, and always, weather) - to a more existential consideration that weaved in and out of the nature observations. The final one third deals often with the mind, the human condition, the beauty of nature, and faith, and it's brilliant.

[Amanda Morris · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't think poetry is taught especially well, at least in the U.S. We start out with very simplistic rhymes and by the time we are ready to encounter more complex poetry it becomes a vehicle for the political agenda of the academy. (Not that poetry must be apolitical, but the poetry becomes the excuse for the politics.) Massey's poetry reminds me that a poem can just be ENJOYED, without a conceit or a gimmick. He captures the magic in the mundane, the sublimity of a little moment that you didn't realize you would always remember until all of a sudden one day you did. It's not that the poetry is childish at all, but it makes me think of what it was like as a child when everything you encountered was still so new and something as simple as an icy puddle or a bird's feather held the possibility of magic.

[Mazelit · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read one poem a day. Tear a page out and give your best friend a poem, send one in a birthday card, take a picture and post it to your instagram page. Joseph Massey's poetry is best devoured slow, shared with friends, and appreciated like a glass of fine vino.

Rosary of Air, his previous book, was a great read too. But I really love this new book the most!