PIG

by Sam Sax

From the brilliantly talented National Poetry Series and James Laughlin Award winner comes a third collection of poems that uses the humble pig as a lens to explore the body, faith, desire, and power.

This imaginative and singular poetry collection interrogates the broadest ideas surrounding the humble pig—farm animal, men/masculinity, police and state violence, desire, queerness, global food systems, religion/Judaism and law—to reimagine various chaotic histories of the body, faith, ecology, desire, hygiene, and power.

Sam Sax draws on autobiography and history to create poems that explore topics ranging from drag queens and Miss Piggy to pig farming and hog lagoons. Collectively, these poems, borne of Sax’s obsession, offer a varied picture of what it means to be a human being. Delivered in a variety of forms, infused with humor, grace, sadness, and anger, Pig is a wholly unique collection from a virtuosic and original poet.

Genres: Poetry, LGBT, Queer, Queer Lit, Audiobook, Gay, Transgender

Unknown Binding

First published September 19, 2023

About the author

sam sax is a queer, jewish, writer and educator. They're the author of PIG (2023, Scribner) and Yr Dead (2024, McSweeney’s), as well as Madness, winner of The National Poetry Series and ‘Bury It’ winner of the James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets. They're the two time Bay Area Grand Slam Champion with poems and stories published in The New York Times, Granta, The Los Angeles Review of Books and elsewhere. Sam's received fellowships from  The NEA, Poetry Foundation, MacDowell, and is currently serving as an ITALIC Lecturer at Stanford University

Reviews

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all] · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘in the beginning pig offered its body so the world
might be built & when this world ends,
pig will inherit.’

Sam Sax is a poet I’ve loved following the past few years and each time I think he can’t get better, like magic, he does. This collection is startling yet comforting, poems to wrap around you like a favorite filthy blanket as you sweat out a hangover. I loved them. Pig is an extraordinary work that cycles around the titular animal, which becomes a transcendent and multi-faceted symbol for Sax’s prose to dissect in order to examine ideas of society, history, desire, State and religious violence, queerness and other aspects of identity in a realm where the boundaries between animal and human begin to blend. It is a very creative collection that keeps to its central image of the pig without ever overplaying the idea and arriving from a variety of continuously fresh and provocative angles of insight. From looking at pigs in history and pop culture to showing the symbol of the pig as an “unclean” animal as an expression of those outcast from heteronormative and other cultural norms, Pig is an arresting and moving collection of poems that is a joy to return to again and again to sift through the impressively layered messages within.

IT'S A LITTLE ANXIOUS TO BE A VERY SMALL ANIMAL ENTIRELY SURROUNDED

the world was already [young/sick/lost] when we came to it
we were busy looking [for/at/through] god
when we went to the dance we brought our new [shoes/father/flask]
borrowed a [shirt/religion/mask] & sat in the bleachers
[music/oil/trash] filled our rivers
stayed up for the after [party/life/math]
the forests were [protected/sold/ash]
we wrote [letters/checks/ads] against corruption
blamed [science/systems/depression] for our cities
when the [oceans/fires/droughts] came
when the [rain/bomb/flu] came
when the [weather/weather/weather] came
we [weathered/welcomed/watered] it
we were [prepared/shocked/responsible]
please for one line look nowhere else
who made our [life/language/living] here
whoever eats [rivers/ash/lambs] will return
each time we turn our mouths to [sob/scream/song]
children are blameless as they become [gone/ghosts/gods]

I love this collection and each time I pick it back up I find something new that completely dazzles or destroys me. Sax is incredible and the playfulness of this collection really shines through and makes for an enjoyable read even in the bleakest of moments within it. My heart is also certainly won by the vast collection of fictional pigs referenced in this collection, from classics such as ‘odysseus’s men who chose to stay, to modern references such as the ‘30-50 feral hogs that run into my yard within 3-5 mins while my small kids play’ that gave us all a laugh on twitter. We even have a poem celebrating Miss Piggy as ‘great porcine drag queen…seminal queer iconoclast!’ I enjoyed catching a reference, such as in the poem Three Stories with ‘in the end, the children come to learn, the beast lives in them.’ (Lord of the Flies) or ‘in the end, it is the animal’s proximity to language that saves him.’ (Charlotte's Web) and the book begins with a quote from Animal Farm and concludes with Porky Pig’s sign off ‘th-th-th-that’s all folks!’ Though perhaps my favorite are the titles that quote famous pigs, such as the Piglet (of the Hundred Acre Woods) quote in the above poem or another with a quote from Charles M. Schulz’s Pigpen: ‘I have affixed to me the dirt of countless ages. Who am I to disturb history?’

History is indeed alive in this collection, such as the opening poem which quickly recounts the history of pigs and their importance to society and ends with a warning of pigs inheriting the earth once society is gone. The first half of the book spends a lot of time on historical references, including a poem on the H1N1 virus that speaks towards ‘the next great illness to wing or swim or sing its way towards us.’ We also have Experiments, which repeats the poem twice with the second told in reverse, looking at a scene of a classroom where a pig dissection was interrupted by 9/11 happening. Though at the end of this section the pig and reader become one as ‘the shohet / sharpens his blade & turns / his attention at last toward / the reader’ and we begin to see the animal and man merge. In Authors Note we see Sax begin to blur ideas of degradation and desire—a running theme of these poems is embracing the filth and the pig inside us all, especially as a queer person that is already considered “unclean” by society—and Sax writes ‘once did look into the eye of a pig…and saw reflected back the blurred terror of this american world.’ This dredges up the numerous references to State violence, ostracization and exploitation that fill these pages as we begin to see that the pig is also us. ‘Who hasn’t lived,’ he asks us, ‘unclean / cast in a herd / drowned in the sea?’

The social condemnations in this collection hit hard. We have Etymology, which examines the language of guns, and language is another symbol that recurs through the text. ‘in an effort to save a dying language, ’ he writes in one of the several poems with Piglet’s Very Small Animal quote as the title, ‘we stockpile books / balanced on the edge of legibility / in the basement of a modern building / paid for by the dying / apply for grants to teach this old alphabet to children.’ A few lines later he discusses a library collecting poems from children in countries under assault and that ‘this project is funded by the same government / that bankrupted their soil & currency.’ Language is our fight against our extinction, our way to pass on our memories, to communicate, to love, and for any poet language is also the center of their work. How tragic the imagery of funding the preservation of words from people we are also slaughtering. Like pigs, he reminds us. Though perhaps the strongest statements against State violence come in his poem Antizionist Abecedarian, a poem that Poetry Foundation objected to and banned any reviews of this very book from being published on their website for being critical of Israel bombing Palestine (Sax is Jewish, which comes up often in this collection). (
2000 writers have recently signed to boycott Poetry Foundation for their banning reviews of this collection of poetry. Read about it HERE. Here is the poem:

after you've finished
building your missiles & after your borders
collapse under the weight of their own split
databases
every worm in this
fertile & cursed
ground will be its own country.
home never was a place in dirt or even
inside the skin but rather
just exists in language. let me explain. my people
kiss books as a form of prayer. if dropped we
lift them to our lips &
mouth an honest & uncomplicated apology—
nowhere on earth belongs to us.
once a man welcomed me home as i entered the old city so i
pulled out a book of poems to show him my papers—my
queer city of paper—my people's ink
running through my blood.
settlers believe land can be possessed—
they carve their names into firearms &
use this to impersonate the dead—we are
visitors here on earth.
who but men blame the angels for the wild
exceptionalism of men?
yesterday a bird flew through an airport & i watched that border
zone collapse under its wings.

Once again we see how language is vital to this work and to us as people. It connects, borders separate. Violence is everywhere in this collection and Sax shows how we are asked to turn away from thinking about it, ‘don’t worry, the market loves you,’ he jokes in Capital. A few lines here:

the market wants you but not your opinions
doesn’t want you to inquire into what money is
this little piggy went to market and returned to its repossessed duplex
this little piggy went to market and came back with half its meat harvested
this little piggy went into a field and became the market
vendors are currently hedging stock in its tenderloin
algorithms are being written out in back fat.
O market O maker

It is no wonder Sax writes ‘it’s clear the future does not bode well for the living.’ These poems move deathward, towards the end of civilization and humankind and asks ‘what will be left.’ He proposes ‘dance with me a moment / late in this last extinction // that you are reading this / must be enough’ which is a rather beautiful sentiment that reminds us of the power of communion and companionship with one another, even when all seems lost. What will be left is the pig.

‘O bless all this life thrashing against death’s
garish precipice, O bless me lord, bless me doorman,
bless me cormorant & courtship & torture & husbandry,
give me enough compression to remember i once lived here
& i’ll accept in the end not even death will wife me’

Though not all is bleak here, even when it is. There is a lot of beauty here, even beauty in the degradation of it all. He writes of love, people who make his throat filled with flowers, ‘such beautiful flowers / i hardly have the words.’ And these poems are gorgeous in that way as well, in the way that Mahmoud Darwish wrote ‘ A poem in a difficult time. is beautiful flowers in a cemetery.’ Thank you for the flowers, Sam Sax. Pig is an extraordinary collection and I will be reading this many many times more.

5/5

Okay but also check out this poem he does in place of the notes about the Font that appear at the end of books:

COLOPHON

this book is set
in a history of speaking.
a font is more
than baptizing water
than an oil reservoir
in a lamp. it asks
only: do you know
what i mean? & if not speak
it back to me so
i might understand
more clearly

[Harris Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

By aversion, or maybe simply evasion, the pig is of no culinary interest to a Jew, though it figures predominantly in Sax’s eponymous collection. For him (a self-described queer Jew) and many other Semites, the epicurean satisfaction of pork outweighs abstinence. As you read ‘Pig’ you’ll understand that social constraints and the etiquette of kashrut come a distant second to candidness and self-satisfaction, and as the publisher says, it’s not just the porcine variant of the pig that receives his critical appraisal; naturally, the police fall within this domain.

‘This singular poetry collection interrogates the broadest ideas surrounding the humble pig—farm animal, men/masculinity, police and state violence, desire, queerness, global food systems, religion/Judaism, and law.’ 

Though back to kashrut, interestingly, ibex, antelopes, and gazelles are kosher, though I’ve never tried them I did eat a kangaroo burger (not kosher) in Spain; if you’re curious it had a strong taste and was a bit dry. But it seems Sax’s family were never that frum, in ‘Sic Transit Gloria Mundi’ he writes on understanding his grandfather farmed swine:

‘one moment your drinking a cheap beer / in a velour jumpsuit and the next / you’re descendant of jewish pig farmers’

Furthermore, a Jew must find a ruminant before he can sate any carnivorous impulse, though (not without reason) Sax finds this reasoning odd, in ‘On the True Ruminants’:

‘the pig isn’t & yet its hoof / is cloven how god wants it— / tho be wary the split foot / which draws a butcher in / not knowing the beast to be / monogastric as we speaking are— / why would any god want / our meat many-stomached? / seems arbitrary’

Notably, he challenges not just preconceptions, but prudery with a grandiose sense of impudence, especially when penning an ode to the impending birth of his nibling (a gender-neutral form of niece/nephew).  Knowing Sax well, his brother encouraged him not to include the word ‘semen’, though maybe some things are best left unsaid, as Sax wrote in ‘For My Niblings in Anticipation of Their Birth’:

‘semen in the books. semen in the leaves. semen / in the ground that grows the semen trees also / known as the callery pear. semen in the boat / that carried our family here. semen in the waters / where we left our dead. semen in the meadows / where we buried & bled. semen in the light / streaming through the stained glass of our synagogue / the image depicting an ark in an ocean of semen. / gossamer semen. octopus semen. garden of semen.’

Curiously, the fruit of the callery pear is like the lemon tree, impossible to eat (except if you're a bird during the rainy season when the shot-hard fruit soften). The trees also stink, that’s maybe an allusion to the sweet, salty, predominantly ammoniacal putridity of… semen. In ‘The Cock’ there's a basement bar of a presumably inner city locale frequented only by gays, and should you be inclined to play with words as Sax does in form, layout, phonetics and alliteration, you'll find you can take 'semen' out of 'basement' which he then describes how it defines the dance floor, where he found ‘an oddly cold erection (nuzzling its) wet nose into my palm like an elderly dog.’ Aside from semen, he lays bare perverse behaviour and aberrant situations with light-hearted brevity, such that these displays of heteroclitic behaviour offer a reflection of the human condition. Using his candid sincerity he adds breadth to our understanding of human nature, and adds to the narrative of normalisation.

Acts of domination, submission, satyromania awash with bodily fluids. Here, his lines spill over with self-deprecation, laced with degradation, and paradoxically self-affirmation with their candour, especially in the melancholic poignancy of, ‘Poem Written Inside a Leather Pig Mask’, where he muses on the use put to cow skins:

‘but none imagining they might be / remade into the perverted image / of a different living animal / then worn by a man wanting / to be regarded as livestock. / right now this is the queerest thing / i can imagine: the animal yearning / within the animal within the animal. / child who dreams of growing / into a swan only to wake in terror / at a mouth filled with feathers. / i’ve never been lonelier than i am / right now, inside this pig mask / made out of a cow, watching / these men break into each other again & again’

On sexuality it would be difficult not to concur, such is his frankness and insouciance, that he wouldn't flinch in flagellating the devil, who one imagines may have more shame than Sax. At times Sax writes like a deviant Phillip Larkin, with lines awash with bodily fluids, playfully absurd, creative, inventive, comical and wretched. I’d put off reading his debut novel ‘Yr Dead’ till I read the poetry after reading an extract in Granta, but it's the first book I've pencilled in for next year.

Fantastic stuff.

[emma charlton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection was so cool & I'm immediately adding more Sam Sax to my tbr! Sax uses pigs - in historical, media, literary, and other contexts - to write so creatively & beautifully was really impressive. I'll definitely be revisiting this one. (Sealey Challenge day 17) / thanks to NetGalley for the arc!

[Gerhard · Rating 5 out of 5]

'it’s clear the future does not bode well for the living'

Sam Sax, please write a poem about the abomination that is 'macon'.

(I am European / Christian; my partner is Muslim. Pig is the Maginot Line of us as an inter-cultural [gay] couple.)

[Emily Perkovich · Rating 5 out of 5]

I knew I would love this, and I was not disappointed. Thank you Scribner for the ARC

[che · Rating 4 out of 5]

such ease, precision, elegance, and mastery of language! an admirable cocktail of cool and profound. instant favorite.

[anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

tantalizing. possibly my favourite of sax's collections. when they said their gift to this planet is extinction.

from 'everyone's an expert a something':

"when i say i carry my people
inside me i don’t mean a country.
the star that hangs from my neck
is simply a way of saying israel
is not a physical place but can be
written down & carried anywhere.
it says my people are most beautiful
when moving, when movement,
when our only state is the liquid
state of water, is adapting to our container.
homeland sometimes just means
what books you’ve read, what stories
you spread with your sneakers.
my people, any place you live
long enough to build bombs
is a place you’ve lived too long—
it’s relative. my friends, the only
thing i know for sure is the missiles
on television are only beautiful
if you’ve never known suffering.
my friends, the only country i will
ever pledge my allegiance to
is your music, is under investigation
for treason."

[willow page · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received a digital copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Pig begins with a quotation from Animal Farm - the familiar, somber acknowledgment of the blurred lines between human and animal, which aptly encapsulates the beautiful, messy ways in which humans and pigs bleed into each other. With research that enlightens creative work, Pig succeeds in narrative storytelling, tender reflection, and depicting the multifaceted and unexpectedly complex roles of pigs. Many of the poems explore queer and Jewish identity, depicting both examples of marginalization and empowerment with deft. Pleasure and pain are depicted as not oppositional but intersecting forces, and both appear simultaneously within many of the pieces. Through "Pig", Sax uses an unlikely vehicle to showcase their poetic expertise.

[Magdelanye · Rating 5 out of 5]

'In the beginning there was a beginning and before
that it had already begun. p58
from the Poem Etymology

life might indeed have ridden here on the back of a screaming meteorite
but here still we persist in this annual trip around our sun. p15
I have a hole in me...
swallows everything p16
from the poem Easy Fast Queers

I've found me
a part of and apart from at once
in a filthy lawn chair overlooking my own life. p77
from the poem Street Fair

Maybe because I was born in the Year of the Pig; attracted to the colourful post modern version of whimsy on the cover, I grabbed this slim volume by an unknown author off of the New Arrivals shelf and poetry pig that I am when I discover a new-to-me poet, gobbled it up in the next few days.

visitors, here on earth
who but men blame the angels for the wild
exceptionalism of man? p29
from the poem Epithalamium

Sam Sax has assembled an array of his poetry that slaughters any lingering stereotypes a cautious reader might hold about Queer White Jews. Not everyone will love this collection as I do. But for those readers who felt a stir of resonance with the quotes I have provided, you just might.
And now that I realize this I am greedy to explore everything he's written.

What will be left after we've left
I dare not consider it
instead dance with me a moment
late in this last extinction
that you are reading this
must be enough

from the poem It's a Little Anxious to Be a Very Small Animal
Entirely Surrounded by water.

[Lauren D'Souza · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a brilliant concept, to write a whole book of poems on the theme of pigs, surrounded by all of the cultural, biological, and religious symbolism that this animal carries in our society. Sax writes of hog farms – castration, lean hog markets, manure lagoons, COVID ravaging processing facilities – and the non-ruminant biology of a pig; Miss Piggy, cop pigs, Jewish taboos on pork, Piglet, Animal Farm, H1N1, 30-50 feral hogs, and the simple fact that pigs cannot look up. Sax also writes of his own queerness, Jewish identity, and family through this lens.

His poems beg to be read aloud. This may be my first poetry collection where reading the poems only with my eyes made me feel like I was missing something, and I just started reading them out loud, to myself. His alliteration, syntax, and word choice are perfect for this. Highly recommend. Thank you to Scribner for the ARC via Netgalley.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very talented poet.

[Noah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just fantastic — one of the best collections of poetry I’ve read in a long time. One that gives and gives and doesn’t shy away from anything.

[Elena · Rating 5 out of 5]

i had a gorgeous time

tysm to netgalley for this rockin arc

[Haylee Perry · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars rounded up. I’m not a big poetry person, but I’m trying to read more poetry this month. I couldn’t resist a book of poems all about my favorite animal, and I was surprised by the number of cultural, spiritual, social, etc. connotations of the word “pig.” While I failed to understand many of these poems due to my own lack of interest in figurative language, the ones that stuck out to me were VERY good. Sam Sax did a great job at discussing themes related to their personal religion and relationships as well as pandemics and cultural phenomenon that is relatable to everyone. Thank you NetGalley for this ARC!

[maren · Rating 3 out of 5]

not all for me! but some of them Really were. ode to the belt & lisp are the standouts for me

[Jonathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some really excellent poems, and some poems that felt less memorable. sam sax writes great stuff, always look forward to new work from them.

[Kariana!!! · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nothing more iconic than referring to Ezra Pound as "Some Pig"

[M]

I’ve picked up “Pig: Poems” by Sam Sax because - how could I not? Queer, Jewish, into BDSM, his anti-zionist poems showing up often in my Insta feed, it was just irresistible. But of course, I was wary of his treatment of “pig” (as a concept). To dissect the “pig” conceptually, to put oneself in his place and draw lines of connection is not an easy thing to do, and Sax doesn’t clearly do it from an antispeciesist perspective - thus often running the risk of erasing the “pig” as a being from the process. This happens in the very first poem, for example, in which the pig as a world-maker sacrifices themselves. Why? Just before that, the first section of the poetry collection, called “straw”, illustrates a cut pig into parts used for food (and names them: head, loin, etc.). Having said that, I had a lot of mixed feelings throughout the whole book - it is not so easy to grasp what Sax’s position towards actual pigs is (beings who are slaughtered massively in industrial facilities, their lives pure suffering, their deaths pollution). Some of the poems seem to acknowledge the injustice of their death, some not at all. Confused by this, I couldn’t make up my mind what I thought of the whole collection.

I loved “Anti-Zionist Abecedarian” and “Everyone’s An Expert At Something” (my people, any place you live / long enough to build bombs / is a place you’ve lived too long—), and I plan to read more of his work.

[tiff · Rating 3 out of 5]

will try again w this book i think but i’m more sold on the idea than the actual poetry.

[Ally Bonhaus · Rating 5 out of 5]

an incredible poet, covers everything you can think of and more eloquently

“glad to have only / suffered / in the imaginable ways.”

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Curly! Straight! Curly! Straight! “I’ve never been lonelier than I am right now, inside this pig mask, made out of a cow.”

[emma]

“the callery / pears are loud this season & my throat is bright / with flowers for you both. such beautiful flowers / i hardly have the words.”

[Caroline Weschler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sam Sax I love you so much. A book of poetry where all the poems are related but they’re all different enough that it never EVER feels boring. There are poets and there are POETS and Sam Sax is a POET. Read this (or any of his works) and you will understand the capitalization.

[k · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pig by Sam Sax is a debut poetry collection drenched in pig references that allow the reader to soak up every aspect of its being. From pigpen to plate the process of the pig’s consumption links Sax’s main narratives: the examination of the carnal and spiritual. Sax offers cultural commentary, explores religion and identity, grapples with desire vs. restraint, plays with form, and displays masterful use of enjambment and volta. Numerous poems evoked a visceral reaction and prompted me to instantly re-read.

Some of my favorite pieces in this collection include Lisp, Interpellation, Author’s Note, Capital, Epithalamium, H1N1, Experiments, Lex Talionis, Porchetta Di Testa, and It’s a Little Anxious to be a Very Small Animal Entirely Surrounded. Thank you to Scribner and NetGalley for the ARC!

[abby · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am a huge admirer of sam sax’s poetry, so I went into reading their new collection “pig” with high expectations. They smashed them. This collection uses pigs of all kinds — from Mrs. Piggy to 30-50 feral hogs to fetishwear/ BDSM — to explore the body, desire& consumption, Judaism and anti-capitalism and reveal truths about what it is to be human. Sax’s writing is masterful; they know how to play with form and bend language in witty, surprising ways. I am sure will be returning to this collection again and will definitely be purchasing when it is released. Many thanks NetGalley and Scribner for the advance copy.

[Carina Stopenski · Rating 5 out of 5]

thanks to netgalley for a free ARC of this title!
i adore everything that sam sax writes, but with pig, they truly outdo themselves, breathing life into viscera in this themed collection. the porcine undertones that weave through poems ranging from kosher to kink, and a whole lot in between, sax creates pieces that do not shy from grotesquerie in what it means to be human, to be made of meat. they are unapologetic in the subjects they represent, and their poetic voice is raw, realized, and varied from piece to piece. a truly remarkable collection that all fans of experimental queer poetry should go into blind.

[Tizi · Rating 2 out of 5]

⭐⭐/⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I don't think I have read the word semen this many times before.
Went in with high expectations, ended up with a very strange combination of tahereh mafi, rupi kaur and Sally rooney. The last one because I couldn't stand the notes app punctuation and lack of capital letters.
The content was meh, the only poem worth bringing up would be the anti zionist one, that one made me feel something, but the rest? Time wasted.
I always feel bad after writing a two star review, so I won't make it long, just wasn't my cup of tea.

Bookworm greetings, Tizi 🤓📚

[Ags · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe more or at least equal parts genitals as pigs. This is not a formal complaint.

10/10 for concept. Wow, what a concept. From George Orwell to Miss Piggy, most of this slaps. Really nice blend of humor, politics, and high brow exploration of living in a mess of power and borders. Many of these poems, especially the ones with Drag Queens, Pigpen, and Miss Piggy are also just very fun to share.

[Suzy]

love a gross, sexy book about food, ancestry, desire, politics, & judaism lol.

My feelings varied from poem to poem. Realizing my favorites were the ones that were the most tangentially related to pigs?? Maybe because they were the most unexpected.

a good audiobook experience, would read more from this author!

[Jules · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a pig girl, I approve and highly recommend.