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Wick First Book
The Spectral Wilderness
It's a joy. . .to come nearer to a realm of experience little explored in American poetry, the lives of those who are engaged in the complex project of transforming their own gender... Oliver Bendorf writes from a paradoxical, new-world position: the adult voice of a man who has just appeared in the world. A man emergent, a man in love, alive in the fluid instability of any category. --Mark Doty, from the Foreword
Best Poetry Book of 2014— Entropy Magazine
30 Must-Read Poetry Debuts from 2015 — Lithub
Spectacular Books of 2015 — Split This Rock
“Bendorf’s poems give us all we have ever wanted, to wake up and feel that the body we are in is ours, that the hands on the ends of our wrists—our body’s gates of tenderness—are large enough to hold in them all the things we have desired.” —Natalie Diaz, author of When My Brother Was An Aztec
“Astonishing.” —The Literary Review
“Oliver Bendorf’s poems draw unflinching attention to the process of making… Bendorf strips a poem to its scaffold with an honesty that is at once funny and unbearably sad.” —Blackbird
“Bendorf’s collection indeed opens the door to a spectral wilderness, an otherworldly pastoral, a queer ecology endlessly transformed by possibility, grief, and the unruly wanting of our names and bodies. Stunningly lyrical and beautifully theoretical, The Spectral Wilderness is an invitation one cannot turn down; the book calls us to travel with Bendorf, to study the topography of becoming because ‘what we used to be matters’ in the way that language matters— however fleeting, however mistaken, however contradictory it might be.” —Stacey Waite, author of Butch Geography
“What gorgeous and ravenous rackets Oliver Bendorf’s poems are made of; what a yearning and beautiful heart. ‘Lift a geode from the ground and crack me open,’ he writes, which is more or less what these poems do for me: break me open to what might sparkle and blaze, what might glisten and burn inside. The Spectral Wilderness is a wonderful book.” —Ross Gay, author of Against Which and Bringing the Shovel Down
“The Spectral Wilderness is full of beautiful little bodies, written into being (into becoming) by a maker from whom we’ll continue to be amazed and enchanted.” —Lambda Literary
Best Poetry Book of 2014— Entropy Magazine
30 Must-Read Poetry Debuts from 2015 — Lithub
Spectacular Books of 2015 — Split This Rock
“Bendorf’s poems give us all we have ever wanted, to wake up and feel that the body we are in is ours, that the hands on the ends of our wrists—our body’s gates of tenderness—are large enough to hold in them all the things we have desired.” —Natalie Diaz, author of When My Brother Was An Aztec
“Astonishing.” —The Literary Review
“Oliver Bendorf’s poems draw unflinching attention to the process of making… Bendorf strips a poem to its scaffold with an honesty that is at once funny and unbearably sad.” —Blackbird
“Bendorf’s collection indeed opens the door to a spectral wilderness, an otherworldly pastoral, a queer ecology endlessly transformed by possibility, grief, and the unruly wanting of our names and bodies. Stunningly lyrical and beautifully theoretical, The Spectral Wilderness is an invitation one cannot turn down; the book calls us to travel with Bendorf, to study the topography of becoming because ‘what we used to be matters’ in the way that language matters— however fleeting, however mistaken, however contradictory it might be.” —Stacey Waite, author of Butch Geography
“What gorgeous and ravenous rackets Oliver Bendorf’s poems are made of; what a yearning and beautiful heart. ‘Lift a geode from the ground and crack me open,’ he writes, which is more or less what these poems do for me: break me open to what might sparkle and blaze, what might glisten and burn inside. The Spectral Wilderness is a wonderful book.” —Ross Gay, author of Against Which and Bringing the Shovel Down
“The Spectral Wilderness is full of beautiful little bodies, written into being (into becoming) by a maker from whom we’ll continue to be amazed and enchanted.” —Lambda Literary
88 pages, Paperback
First published September 12, 2014
7 people are currently reading
339 people want to read
About the author
Oliver Baez Bendorf
10 books50 followersOliver Baez Bendorf is the author of Consider the Rooster (Nightboat, 2024), a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and two previous collections of poems: Advantages of Being Evergreen (Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2019) and The Spectral Wilderness (Kent State U.P., 2015). He has received fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Publishing Triangle, CantoMundo, Vermont Studio Center, and the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing. He was born and raised in Iowa.
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
February 2, 2022
Really lovely - I didn't even know there was poetry out there that rounds up all the intricate feelings I have about existing as a transmasc person, nature, agriculture, queer love, John Muir, and the exquisite lack of billboards in Vermont. This collection covers a lot of emotional ground, yet feels light and ethereal and, yes, spectral.
September 5, 2023
some clever & touching pieces. surprised this collection does not have more reviews!
November 16, 2015
"You say, because you wanted
to be young, you wore the open window.
You hear a dumb thing like 'the boy unfolded
like a lotus flower' but in private you think
that sounds pretty nice. It's a good story:
the blossom unfolds overnight, one petal
at a time. In the morning, nothing but
sunlight on the new parts."
- from "The No Shame Theatre"
poems i want to return to: "i promised her my hands wouldn't get any larger", "prelude", "second winter".
to be young, you wore the open window.
You hear a dumb thing like 'the boy unfolded
like a lotus flower' but in private you think
that sounds pretty nice. It's a good story:
the blossom unfolds overnight, one petal
at a time. In the morning, nothing but
sunlight on the new parts."
- from "The No Shame Theatre"
poems i want to return to: "i promised her my hands wouldn't get any larger", "prelude", "second winter".
March 18, 2025
3/18/2025 - I have so many feelings about this collection of poems. It was an assigned reading for my Gender, Sexuality, and Environment literature course but I ultimately have walked away seeing a piece of myself in it. One where it is familiar yet foreign. Seeing the Midwest in a different light, one where I am represented has altered my universe. As Audre Lorde describes in “Uses of the Erotic,” this collection ignites my passion, my curiosity of the unknown, and my love for my queer identity on levels I didn’t even know existed. I know I will add on to this later, just like handprints on paper (3). But it will be for myself.
August 27, 2025
phenomenal
September 2, 2015
Oliver Bendorf's The Spectral Wilderness is beautiful and hard to describe. Identity, transformation, the geography of gender--all are explored here in an understated but powerful way. Even if you have never questioned your gender, you most certainly have explored your gender and your identity within it. This book speaks to us all in our journey to becoming who we are.
Beautiful language. Fresh metaphors rooted in the natural world.
"Fish learn
from the water
to be fish
and it's wind that teaches birds
to be themselves."
Beautiful language. Fresh metaphors rooted in the natural world.
"Fish learn
from the water
to be fish
and it's wind that teaches birds
to be themselves."
March 16, 2025
Queering the Midwest has got to be my favorite style of writing. Can we please put more corn and horse boots in our poetry?? God this was lovely. The last section feels so much like home I can’t even begin to speak about it.
May 10, 2018
I finally got to reading this after having seen a few of the poems, most notably "Queer Facts about Vegetables," online for a while. What a pleasure to dive into this rich language, these beautiful lyrics of bodies becoming both more and less strange to themselves.
April 15, 2020
More marvelous poetry from Bendorf. More conventional in format (this is his first collection), and seemingly more conventional in relationships too - there was a fair bit of time between books. But equally beautiful, wild, and hopeful, and lovely in making familiar things new.
May 24, 2017
Quite interesting.
June 15, 2019
Beautiful poetry with great Midwest imagery.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 28, 2019
What a great collection, so full of desire and bodies and the ecology of wanting.
April 24, 2022
Gorgeous.
June 21, 2025
love this guy. awesome. another hitter.
July 2, 2025
Patrón’s been having
film dreams
wants to be
the one
doing all the looking.
this got a visceral reaction out of me tbh. great poetry
December 4, 2025
another collection i read when studying poetry. i recommend it to most people who are looking for something deeper than say, rh sin or atticus.
February 1, 2015
Beautiful book of poems, some of which document Oliver's biological sex as female into his gender of being male. Book does much more than that too, and is really quite beautiful.
August 20, 2015
What an inquisitive sense in these poems; questing and searching for the intersections in life: the human body, nature, the heart, gender meaning, artistry. What joy as well.
September 15, 2021
I have no idea wtf this is supposed to be about
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews