This Kind of Thinking Does No Good

by Alison Smith

What will surprise you about Alison Smith’s poems is the tenaciousness that lies beneath their grace and wit, their unwillingness to concede the bittersweet complexity of human experience to either gross reduction or cowed silence. Exploring the domestic epics of relationships, childbirth, and parenting, as well as societal issues like patriarchy and justice, Smith discovers that often “we barely know how feelings think.” But if our stories sometimes elude us-like a skipping rope, where one end is “held slack / by skeptics, the other turned too fast”-Smith’s poems jump in and find expression’s rhythm.

Genres: Poetry

64 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2018

About the author

Librarian Note: There are more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is just the kind of poetry that’s precisely up my alley: not narrative or lesson or insight obsessed, no morality plays within a poem, just sound and language and image and occasional cracks of thunderous meaning and sometimes unclear meaning, some poems a little frustrating, like a bad connection during an important conversation. To me the poems read haunted and feminine and howling and sly and playful.

Read it in two brief sittings, reread many poems and will relish the experience of rereading again and again no doubt.

Also — an exquisite object; the font, paper/cover feel are incredible. Much love for a small press! ❤️