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Last Sext
In her electric fourth collection, Melissa Broder penetrates the itch of existence and explores numberless the annihilation of self, the bereavement of love, the destruction of fantasy, the transmutation, even, of our ideas of dying.One of the New Yorker's Books We Loved in 2016
What emerges is an infinite series of false endings—each a trap door containing the possibility for alchemy, rebirth, and renewal. Part elegy, part confessional, part battle cry, Last Sext confronts both eternal longing and the mystery of mortality, with language hot, primal, and dark, as Broder’s fans have come to love.
What emerges is an infinite series of false endings—each a trap door containing the possibility for alchemy, rebirth, and renewal. Part elegy, part confessional, part battle cry, Last Sext confronts both eternal longing and the mystery of mortality, with language hot, primal, and dark, as Broder’s fans have come to love.
93 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 13, 2016
43 people are currently reading
2519 people want to read
About the author
Melissa Broder
20 books6,257 followersMelissa Broder is the author of the novels DEATH VALLEY, MILK FED and THE PISCES, the essay collection SO SAD TODAY, and five collections of poems including SUPERDOOM: Selected Poems and LAST SEXT.
Her books have been translated in over ten languages.
She lives in Los Angeles.
www.melissabroder.com
Her books have been translated in over ten languages.
She lives in Los Angeles.
www.melissabroder.com
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 145 reviews
February 23, 2023
Most of the time I didn’t really connect or maybe even understand these poems. However a few towards the end did start to resonate.
“You looked so human in your skin
That I called you human in my head
And did not want you then
And felt relieved”
“You looked so human in your skin
That I called you human in my head
And did not want you then
And felt relieved”
January 18, 2023
melissa broder, i love you to death, but it's possible that your poetry is just not for me. the personal essay collection so sad today was an instant favorite, but this was a rough read.
it's interesting, because so many of the much-repeated phrases in last sext are right up my alley. we have "lunar shatters," "necro glow," "boring angel," "liquid end," "dust moan," "taste tombs." the dark, unapologetically vulgar vibes are impeccable. but the poetry itself is far too abstract for me. the book as a whole was a very ???? experience. i sincerely wish i could have loved this.
it's interesting, because so many of the much-repeated phrases in last sext are right up my alley. we have "lunar shatters," "necro glow," "boring angel," "liquid end," "dust moan," "taste tombs." the dark, unapologetically vulgar vibes are impeccable. but the poetry itself is far too abstract for me. the book as a whole was a very ???? experience. i sincerely wish i could have loved this.
April 13, 2017
I went under my skin
Which was my old skin
And under the skin of my soul
Which was an old soul
Though new to me
There was so much silence
I was surprised to like it
Poetry is a tricky thing to review. Reading it is so deeply personal, and a great poem for one person is not an objectively great poem for another. For example: I hate Emily Dickenson. I don't think she is a bad poet, but nothing she's written has moved me at all. I find her very dry. And a lot of people find her one of the best poets to ever write. So when I say I loved and adored Last Sext what I mean is that it spoke to my soul in a way few collections of poetry do.
This is a raw, visceral collection. The bones of Melissa Broder are splayed open. It's dark, twisted, and lyrical. There are moments of quiet self-reflection, but more loud and explosive moments of violence (against others, against the self, against god). Gender, self identity, sex, death, and god are the main themes: all things that are pretty much universal, but she handles them in a way that felt so unique. At times the lines are so personal and exposed you almost want to look away, until you realize you identify so strongly with them it brings tears to your eyes.
This is not an easy reading collection. There are many changes in tense, pronoun, subject... pretty much any linguistic comfort is turned on its head. There's lots of vomit and drowning and death. The language is at times crude, not for shock value but to highlight the raw grossness of the human experience. The whole book is a struggle, and it reads like one. Nothing is clean or neatly wrapped up. Emotions are not displayed in little glass boxes for the reader to go "oh, yes, I've felt that." They sweep you up like the thematic ocean that runs through many of the poems, and it's easy to get lost in them. If you like darker, more experimental poetry with a depressing twist I would definitely recommend giving this a go, but if you like the more traditional it probably isn't for you.
[arc provided by netgalley in exchange for an honest review]
Which was my old skin
And under the skin of my soul
Which was an old soul
Though new to me
There was so much silence
I was surprised to like it
Poetry is a tricky thing to review. Reading it is so deeply personal, and a great poem for one person is not an objectively great poem for another. For example: I hate Emily Dickenson. I don't think she is a bad poet, but nothing she's written has moved me at all. I find her very dry. And a lot of people find her one of the best poets to ever write. So when I say I loved and adored Last Sext what I mean is that it spoke to my soul in a way few collections of poetry do.
This is a raw, visceral collection. The bones of Melissa Broder are splayed open. It's dark, twisted, and lyrical. There are moments of quiet self-reflection, but more loud and explosive moments of violence (against others, against the self, against god). Gender, self identity, sex, death, and god are the main themes: all things that are pretty much universal, but she handles them in a way that felt so unique. At times the lines are so personal and exposed you almost want to look away, until you realize you identify so strongly with them it brings tears to your eyes.
This is not an easy reading collection. There are many changes in tense, pronoun, subject... pretty much any linguistic comfort is turned on its head. There's lots of vomit and drowning and death. The language is at times crude, not for shock value but to highlight the raw grossness of the human experience. The whole book is a struggle, and it reads like one. Nothing is clean or neatly wrapped up. Emotions are not displayed in little glass boxes for the reader to go "oh, yes, I've felt that." They sweep you up like the thematic ocean that runs through many of the poems, and it's easy to get lost in them. If you like darker, more experimental poetry with a depressing twist I would definitely recommend giving this a go, but if you like the more traditional it probably isn't for you.
[arc provided by netgalley in exchange for an honest review]
February 8, 2016
There are quite a few words that are repeated throughout the poems in this book - vomit, water, cock - you might say it's repetitive, or you might say that the poet is exploring several ideas that won't leave her until she sorts them out in poetic form. That seems to be more what is going on here. The poems explore gender and sex, power and role, sickness and pain, but in tangible, visceral, words of experience.
Some of my favorites (my copy has the titles all in caps):
LUNAR SHATTERS
WHAT WE LOVE MOST IS DEFINITELY GOING TO KILL US HALLELUJAH
THE VANISHING WOMAN
DUST MOAN
BROKEN OCEAN
CHROME COUNTRY (which seems like a follow up to hallelujah earlier)
(If you've never heard of Broder before, a recent poem is available online. Although Salt is not in this volume, it is similar in tone to what you will find here.)
I received a review copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Some of my favorites (my copy has the titles all in caps):
LUNAR SHATTERS
WHAT WE LOVE MOST IS DEFINITELY GOING TO KILL US HALLELUJAH
THE VANISHING WOMAN
DUST MOAN
BROKEN OCEAN
CHROME COUNTRY (which seems like a follow up to hallelujah earlier)
(If you've never heard of Broder before, a recent poem is available online. Although Salt is not in this volume, it is similar in tone to what you will find here.)
I received a review copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
December 31, 2022
not the kind of poetry i like. i’m sorry. i tried liking it but i couldn’t.
October 21, 2020
felt like endless run-ons that were also somehow incredibly stilted by enjambment
too edgy, even for me. if you took the drawling intros to doors songs + my middle school poetry, you'd probably get this.
confessional, but not in a pleasant way. felt like shock-porn. an excuse to say cock & vomit & sex, but lacks the meaning of the admission.
overall, disjointed + disorienting.
too edgy, even for me. if you took the drawling intros to doors songs + my middle school poetry, you'd probably get this.
confessional, but not in a pleasant way. felt like shock-porn. an excuse to say cock & vomit & sex, but lacks the meaning of the admission.
overall, disjointed + disorienting.
July 17, 2016
i really like her twitter feed and would recommend following it but i really did not like this book. i'm sure her newer published stuff is better
March 7, 2016
As much as I loved Melissa Broder's provoking and moving and honest essay collection SO SAD TODAY (which is to say: a lot), her poetry *really* doesn't give rise to anything in me beyond mild irritation and some eye-rolling. I read her first collection, MEAT HEART, last year, and the only poem I liked in the whole collection was the final poem. I liked it so much that I scanned a copy of it before giving the book away to someone else. There wasn't one poem in Last Sext I responded to at all, or at least none that I felt I wanted to hold on to. The poems feel unfinished and underthought; drifting demonstrations of the writer trying and then failing to achieve a certain effect, pull off a certain trick. They're also pretty repetitive and therefore don't demonstrate much in the way of range. That being said, if you read one poem from either collection, you'll probably like the whole thing. (And it's obviously completely possible that Broder's poetry just isn't for me!)
I hate to write a bad review, because I really did find SO SAD TODAY to be a terrific collection, and I hope it gets some great press when it comes out this month. And because Melissa seems like an awesome person. It's just my suggestion that you turn to her essays first, as the poems might scare you off and leave you disinclined to read anything else of hers, and that would be a shame.
I hate to write a bad review, because I really did find SO SAD TODAY to be a terrific collection, and I hope it gets some great press when it comes out this month. And because Melissa seems like an awesome person. It's just my suggestion that you turn to her essays first, as the poems might scare you off and leave you disinclined to read anything else of hers, and that would be a shame.
December 16, 2019
Lolol
Melissa, girl, sis. I loved the Pisces and So Sad Today. You immediately became my favorite writer. This book of poetry though, isn’t a reflection of how capable you are as a writer. I did not enjoy this work at all. I didn’t know what the hell I was looking for between the lines. It felt like I was reading unrelated dreams that you mashed together in an attempt to make sense of their meaning but could not. But I do appreciate that it isn’t a collection of fake deep self help statements like most contemporary poems on instagram. Youre still my fav. I’m still going to read all of your other stuff. Youve enriched my life for the most part.
Melissa, girl, sis. I loved the Pisces and So Sad Today. You immediately became my favorite writer. This book of poetry though, isn’t a reflection of how capable you are as a writer. I did not enjoy this work at all. I didn’t know what the hell I was looking for between the lines. It felt like I was reading unrelated dreams that you mashed together in an attempt to make sense of their meaning but could not. But I do appreciate that it isn’t a collection of fake deep self help statements like most contemporary poems on instagram. Youre still my fav. I’m still going to read all of your other stuff. Youve enriched my life for the most part.
June 15, 2017
This collection will speak to a lot of people. Unfortunately I was not one of them. On the surface this collection has a lot going for it that appeals to me: the tension between the sacred and the profane, existential dread, exploration of the ephemeral and mortality, diving into gender and sexuality, etcetera. However, the collection as a whole fell flat for me.
Broder uses a great deal of repetition in her poems, which can be fine. That repetition also echoes through the entire collection, which can also be fine if done well. This was not, in my opinion, done well. He language is harsh and sparse, which makes the repetition feel, well, repetitious. I couldn't shake how much it felt like I was reading the same poem over and over again - the same words rejumbled in a different order, like refrigerator poetry. Again, this sort of device could be used to brilliant effect, but in this case it felt like reading endless revisions.
This is an angry, dark, and sexual collection (which I actually enjoy), and there is a lot of meat in here. Most of the poems have at least one brilliant line, they just get swallowed by the work as a whole. The abstract is favored over the concrete, and symbolism rules out over the sensory. For me it felt more like a work of the mind than the heart, despite the sense of immediacy and passion. While I didn't connect to this collection at all I can see how many people will. I just happen to prefer my poetry a bit more grounded in the specific, and more lyrical. I would try Broder again, but in smaller doses.
Personal highlights:
Lunar Shatters
Wide Sigh
Long Tomb
Broder uses a great deal of repetition in her poems, which can be fine. That repetition also echoes through the entire collection, which can also be fine if done well. This was not, in my opinion, done well. He language is harsh and sparse, which makes the repetition feel, well, repetitious. I couldn't shake how much it felt like I was reading the same poem over and over again - the same words rejumbled in a different order, like refrigerator poetry. Again, this sort of device could be used to brilliant effect, but in this case it felt like reading endless revisions.
This is an angry, dark, and sexual collection (which I actually enjoy), and there is a lot of meat in here. Most of the poems have at least one brilliant line, they just get swallowed by the work as a whole. The abstract is favored over the concrete, and symbolism rules out over the sensory. For me it felt more like a work of the mind than the heart, despite the sense of immediacy and passion. While I didn't connect to this collection at all I can see how many people will. I just happen to prefer my poetry a bit more grounded in the specific, and more lyrical. I would try Broder again, but in smaller doses.
Personal highlights:
Lunar Shatters
Wide Sigh
Long Tomb
November 11, 2022
Like always with Broder it was…an experience.
March 9, 2024
«my feelings were dogs with no master left to tend them»
April 8, 2016
It was okay. Teen Evann would have loved it. There is some great imagery and lines. "And I wear my crown of fuck its" is a fave. Honestly if I was moodier today then I would probably give it a higher rating. It's that good kind of angry.
Thanks to Netgalley and Tin House Books for the chance to read and review.
Thanks to Netgalley and Tin House Books for the chance to read and review.
May 1, 2016
Although the poems in this collection are not for everyone, they stir a lot of different dark feelings and issues - confusion, identity, sex, sensuality, mortality, power, love. There are no clear answers here, only exploration, but the yearning in these poems is powerful.
[I received an advanced e-galley of this book from Netgalley. The book is due to be published June 13, 2016.]
[I received an advanced e-galley of this book from Netgalley. The book is due to be published June 13, 2016.]
September 22, 2016
Not totally like her other collections, and the pieces tend to blend together in their style and content, but I do love Broder for her grotesque-ness, for her willingness to write poems about body parts and holes being filled and emptied and other things that people still like to argue women shouldn't write about.
December 31, 2025
“Tell me how to feel and I will feel it.”
“The things that look like life to me are somehow a killing.”
2020 review:
This poetry collection was fantastic. If Sylvia Plath were born 60 years later and tried to use the internet to fill any emotional holes she felt, this would be her poetry collection. Melissa Broder writes poems that are unsettling, visceral, and intense.
“The things that look like life to me are somehow a killing.”
2020 review:
This poetry collection was fantastic. If Sylvia Plath were born 60 years later and tried to use the internet to fill any emotional holes she felt, this would be her poetry collection. Melissa Broder writes poems that are unsettling, visceral, and intense.
April 7, 2021
1. I hate how much Melissa Broder loves vomiting
2. Most of these poems read like they were written with Magnetic Poetry. Something that sounds profound at the time, or profound enough to be sold.
3. What the absolute fuck was any of that
4. You're better than this, Melissa
2. Most of these poems read like they were written with Magnetic Poetry. Something that sounds profound at the time, or profound enough to be sold.
3. What the absolute fuck was any of that
4. You're better than this, Melissa
January 18, 2019
Very strange from what I've read of her tweets.
I wish I was more impressed, but I wasn't. Still a diehard until I die.
I wish I was more impressed, but I wasn't. Still a diehard until I die.
January 12, 2022
“I want to bleed electricity on the shadow of the world
I want to be zero”
“Sick people find each other and it is not a good thing
Sometimes it is a great thing”
“How is love supposed to look and feel?
I half-ask god but am scared to hear”
“I went under my skin
Which was my old skin
And under the skin of my soul
Which was an old soul
Though new to me”
“Fall in all the wells at the same time
Yes I think I am having a human experience
I died in the mind
I died today
The blue sun in the blue sky like my face
My face could never hide anything
I went under my face and found curtains
I played a girl”
“Though the quiet has already eaten me
Because the quiet loves me
But does the lover love me”
I want to be zero”
“Sick people find each other and it is not a good thing
Sometimes it is a great thing”
“How is love supposed to look and feel?
I half-ask god but am scared to hear”
“I went under my skin
Which was my old skin
And under the skin of my soul
Which was an old soul
Though new to me”
“Fall in all the wells at the same time
Yes I think I am having a human experience
I died in the mind
I died today
The blue sun in the blue sky like my face
My face could never hide anything
I went under my face and found curtains
I played a girl”
“Though the quiet has already eaten me
Because the quiet loves me
But does the lover love me”
April 27, 2018
I was first exposed to Broder's work through her brilliant book SO SAD TODAY, and I quickly became a fan of her Twitter account, @sosadtoday. I love the way she's able to evoke a visceral emotion in just a few words. The poetry in this volume is full of that same skill, and has a few moments of similar daring, but I found it too impersonal to really connect to. There's a spiritual seeking going on here that just didn't register with me. Still, definitely a writer to watch.
September 19, 2023
My favorite was “Sources of Light”. The abstract descriptions are what I like and dislike about the book—sometimes they’re too complex for me personally, and at the same time, I like the depth of the reflection in the poems. I would love to know why there is so much mentioning of horses… I really liked the titles of the poems and how they matched the poem itself, but was a little lost on the dark descriptions of death and lust simultaneously.
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October 31, 2021This is a great collection from the author of The Pisces, Milk Fed, and So Sad Today. I haven't yet read her other work, but this collection makes me want to. Specifically, the poem "Necro Glow" is outstanding.
June 1, 2023
I love Melissa Broder’s fiction, but this poetry collection was a big miss for me in a lot of ways. Some of the poems were good, a few lines were even great. But the writing was vulgar and repetitive in a way i found unappealing and uninteresting.
November 28, 2020
— "And everything I touch on Earth / Resembling angels / I try to eat."
May 5, 2021
most of the book just read too disjointed and all over the place
February 22, 2022
“there is a kind of love contingent upon nothing, i’m afraid to be serene for it”
February 22, 2022
I didn’t really get it
June 29, 2023
I love Melissa Broder.
September 5, 2023
gonna ponder with this squatting on my brain for a minute so I can come up with words to describe what I read, or even how I feel... maybe a little more hallow than when I walked in.
September 3, 2023
Hey word salad
Displaying 1 - 30 of 145 reviews