Human Hours: Poems

by Catherine Barnett

Catherine Barnett's tragicomic third collection, Human Hours, shuttles between a Whitmanian embrace of others and a kind of rapacious solitude. Barnett speaks from the middle of hope and confusion, carrying philosophy into the everyday. Watching a son become a young man, a father become a restless beloved shell, and a country betray its democratic ideals, the speakers try to make sense of such departures. Four lyric essays investigate the essential urge and appeal of questions that are “accursed,” that are limited—and unanswered—by answers. What are we to do with the endangered human hours that remain to us? Across the leaps and swerves of this collection, the fevered mind tries to slow—or at least measure—time with quiet bravura: by counting a lover’s breaths; by remembering a father’s space-age watch; by envisioning the apocalyptic future while bedding down on a hard, cold floor, head resting on a dictionary. Human Hours pulses with the absurd, with humor that accompanies the precariousness of the human condition.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2018

About the author

Catherine Barnett is the author of four poetry collections, including Solutions for the Problem of Bodies in Space, Human Hours, winner of the Believer Book Award, and The Game of Boxes, winner of the James Laughlin Award of the Academy of American Poets. She lives in New York City.

Reviews

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whether she's writing about trees communicating and showing love to each other, a father's dementia, black holes colliding billions of light years away or any of the other poems in this extraordinary collection, Barnett writes with wit and an incisive intelligence that leaves me envious of such talent and skill. Many of her poems are painfully funny--and I do mean painfully since, despite their humor, they often deal with subjects so painful that perhaps humor is the only way a person can bear to look at, examine such things.

This was a library book that I'm going to have to replace with a tree book. Definitely these are poems to read again and again.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poems are relatable and easy to read.

[S꩜phie · Rating 4 out of 5]

The teacher of my teacher is my teacher ( at least I wish she was my teacher 😭)

[singingoutl000ud · Rating 4 out of 5]

Catherine takes you to her truth and makes you feel enraptured and intensely blue at the same time. I love how witty her work is. Not shallow and empty words, her prose is fluid, deep and yet intentional on how it was written. Lovely read, highly recommend!

[Marguerite Hargreaves · Rating 2 out of 5]

I kept waiting to be engaged by more than a short phrase, but was disappointed. This doesn't earn a spot on my poetry shelf.

[andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Friend of mine shared with me a poem the New Yorker had included January 15th. IT was "Thought Experiment" by Catherine Barnett. First I'd heard of her, but I recognized myself in that poem, and appreciated knowing my friend understands me well enough to have seen me in it too. It will be included I think in her forthcoming collection, "Solutions for the Problem of Bodies in Space" due out soon. But for now, I enjoyed Human Hours.... over and over again...over many human hours. "Epistemology", and then in the next section: "Appeal to Numbers", "Son in August", "The Art of the Security Question" "O, Experanza" and following "Accursed Question ii: "The Humanities, the Pendulum", "Central Park".... and then all the ones referencing her father...

I've renewed the collection more times than my library allows. time for me to let someone else "have at it" :) wonderfully sublime.

[Bryan Fox · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read a fair amount of poetry, and it's odd, but when I don't like a collection of poems, I can explain why I don't, in great, often vitriolic detail. However, when I do like a collection, I'm at somewhat of a loss of words. All I can say is that a poem hits for me, and these ones do. I like the wordplay, I like the matter-of-fact emotionality, I like the cultural references, I like the Poetry Slam-adjacent feel of some of these pieces. And I can bask a bit in the reflected glory of knowing that I briefly worked at a university where the author has taught. A solid collection.

[Patti K · Rating 3 out of 5]

A 2018 published volume of poems that looks at the permutations
of time, identity and the elusive truths and absurdities of our human
condition. The last two lines of "Epistemology": "Sometimes when I'm alone
I go outside with my big little mouth/ and speak to the trees as if I were a birch
among birches." Powerful poems with humor and philosophy that ask" "What
are we to do with the endangered/ human hours that remain to us?" This work
goes back and forth from the big embrace of Whitmanian poetry and a strong
ache for solitude. Recommend.

[Caroline · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.25 stars

This one was too much of a mixed bag for me, but there were quite a few poems that I really liked. The collection could have used a little more thematic focus.

I appreciated the humor in Barnett's poems. It's definitely a dark, sort of wry humor, but humor nonetheless.

I would recommend this collection if you enjoy slice-of-life poetry, though Barnett's poetry is a bit more introspective than most of that type.

[Wendy L. · Rating 5 out of 5]

The poems in this book are so insightful, incisive and funny. So much meaning....

"Beckett on the Jumbotron" really made me want to cry -- so very poignant.

And Calamity Jane on Etsy after the 2016 election should be broadcast everywhere right now. Who isn't Solicity Jane -- anxious version. What a hopeful, yet sad poem....

Each poem reveals tiny slices of a life well lived.

[Hannah Bevis · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a collection of poems that didn't come together for me until the final quarter, when themes and seemingly unrelated topics wove together. That said, I struggled with this one. There were a couple poems I liked, a couple I bookmarked to use as jumping off points for my own poetry writing, but otherwise, I wasn't impressed.

[Peycho Kanev · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Skin of the Face Is That Which Stays Most Naked, Most Destitute

But it’s in perfectly fine shape, the face in the mirror said—
When I first acquired you, yes, ok, years ago,
on a lark, and you were just something to wear then,
to the store, or the park, not alone in the dark.

[Tom Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Catherine Barnett was already one of my favorite poets writing today, but this book is vaster, funnier, slyer and reaches brighter and more surprising new depths. A great stillness powers her work even as it moves restlessly through necessary ‘accursed questions.’ Just stunning.

[precious Lafleur · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Read

I love Catherine Barnett’s use of imagery and metaphor. She is able to talk about everyday occurrences and different stages of life in a way that brings her poems to life. Her work here is pure genius. As a poet myself, I applaud her.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this collection. The wit and wisdom of the poet sparkled throughout. I laughed out loud a few times reading this. I caught my breath at other times. She writes of eternal things and quiet things and bold things and present things.

[Madi · Rating 3 out of 5]

These were ok. Barnett has a strong vocabulary and writes poems as though they were life rafts.

The standout for me was "Epistemology" which was incredible. I think Barnett could have cut some of the less impressive poems to make an overall stronger collection.

[Kerynnisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

The poems weave such sly humour around descriptions of difficult and painful moments that I often snorted in amusement while also feeling sad and heavy. I loved the science metaphors, and will come back again and again to see if I can figure more of them out.

[Sebastian · Rating 5 out of 5]

First read: September 19, 2018, Wednesday

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful, heartbreaking, and funny book about time and love and too, hope and something like grit. I loved her earlier books, but it’s possible this one is my favorite.

[Abner · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wonderful collection of poems. They seem mundane and everyday but then veer into the fantastic/odd - but not too much, with balance and force.

[Stephen Lamb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a delightful collection, such a pleasure to read.

“Maybe best not to ask when will what take whom where and to do what.”

[Boro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Call me dry but I signed up for more rhythmic lines.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Literary, doggedly oscillating between a rough seriality and an objectivism full of guile and rueful community.

[Mark Yakich]

One of the best collections in the last few years!

[Twila Newey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delicious. Funny. Delicious.

[John Back · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this entire book aloud to my sleeping infant son. He probably doesn't understand most of it, but I do.

[Amie Whittemore · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book grew on me as I read it. I found it so witty and funny and heartfelt at once. I want to read it again. I love all of the questions it raises, all of the uncertainty it sits comfortably in.

[S. Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Personal favorites from this collection: The Light from across the Fields, Forensics, Still Life, The Humanities, Metaphor on the Crosstown, Beckett on the Jumbotron.

[Jordan Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

sometimes I flirt with the cashier, just improvising

[Again and again and again · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed it. A lot of it felt beyond my understanding but still accessible in some way.