What Thoughts

by John Most

An intense, progressive book of poems from an influential new voice in American poetry. John Most is a genius of minimalist wordplay, a thoughtful, visionary poet. By dancing with abstraction, paradox, and clarity, Most willingly accepts the oft-hidden weaknesses of language, how language frequently fails to convey the physical world’s most dire philosophical and ecological problems. What Thoughts is a wonderful example of Most’s ability to imaginatively disassemble and observe the major conundrums of life in the twenty-first century. Proving his capacity to shift seamlessly between intricate ideas and concepts--from the perilous and uncertain to the emotional and unreal--Most painstakingly turns visions into words within a tight range of styles and approaches, from collage and conversational to fractured and lyrical. Sparsely populated by allusions to literature and a post-human future, his poems are haunted by the constantly moving edges of subjective experiences and present technologies. Most’s artfully constructed lines are a concrete manifestation of visions received during an era of pervasive uncertainties.

77 pages, Paperback

Published October 7, 2015

About the author

John Most, poet, was born in Covington, Virginia in 1977.