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This Afterlife
A selection of sharp, witty, and impeccably crafted poems from A. E. Stallings, the award-winning poet and translator.
This Selected Poems brings together poetry from A. E. Stallings’s four acclaimed collections, Archaic Smile, Hapax, Olives , and Like , as well as a lagniappe of outlier poems. Over time, themes and characters reappear, speaking to one another across years and experience, creating a complex music of harmony, dissonance, and counterpoint. The Underworld and the Afterlife, ancient history and the archaeology of the here and now, all slant rhyme with one another. Many of these poems unfold in the mytho-domestic sphere, through the eyes of Penelope or Pandora, Alice in Wonderland or the poet herself. Fulfilling the promise of the energy and sprezzatura of Stallings’s earliest collection, her later technical accomplishments rise to meet the richness of lived of marriage and motherhood, of a life lived in another language and country, of aging and mortality. Her chosen home of Greece adds layers of urgency to her fascination with Greek mythology; living in an epicenter of contemporary crises means current events and ancient history are always rubbing shoulders in her poems.
Expert at traditional received forms, Stallings is also a poet of restless experiment, in cat’s-cradle rhyme schemes, nonce stanzas, supple free verse, thematic variation, and metaphysical conceits. The pleasure of these poems, fierce and witty, melancholy and wise, lies in a timeless precision that will outlast the fickleness of fashion.
This Selected Poems brings together poetry from A. E. Stallings’s four acclaimed collections, Archaic Smile, Hapax, Olives , and Like , as well as a lagniappe of outlier poems. Over time, themes and characters reappear, speaking to one another across years and experience, creating a complex music of harmony, dissonance, and counterpoint. The Underworld and the Afterlife, ancient history and the archaeology of the here and now, all slant rhyme with one another. Many of these poems unfold in the mytho-domestic sphere, through the eyes of Penelope or Pandora, Alice in Wonderland or the poet herself. Fulfilling the promise of the energy and sprezzatura of Stallings’s earliest collection, her later technical accomplishments rise to meet the richness of lived of marriage and motherhood, of a life lived in another language and country, of aging and mortality. Her chosen home of Greece adds layers of urgency to her fascination with Greek mythology; living in an epicenter of contemporary crises means current events and ancient history are always rubbing shoulders in her poems.
Expert at traditional received forms, Stallings is also a poet of restless experiment, in cat’s-cradle rhyme schemes, nonce stanzas, supple free verse, thematic variation, and metaphysical conceits. The pleasure of these poems, fierce and witty, melancholy and wise, lies in a timeless precision that will outlast the fickleness of fashion.
240 pages, Paperback
Published December 5, 2023
43 people are currently reading
407 people want to read
About the author
A.E. Stallings
30 books100 followersAlicia Elsbeth Stallings is an American poet and translator. She was named a 2011 MacArthur Fellow.
Stallings was born and raised in Decatur, Georgia and studied classics at the University of Georgia, and the University of Oxford. She is an editor with the Atlanta Review. In 1999, Stallings moved to Athens, Greece and has lived there ever since. She is the Poetry Program Director of the Athens Centre. She is married to John Psaropoulos, who is the editor of the Athens News.
Stallings' poetry uses traditional forms, and she has been associated with the New Formalism.
She is a frequent contributor of poems and essays to Poetry magazine. She has published three books of original verse, Archaic Smile (1999), Hapax (2006), and Olives (2012). In 2007 she published a verse translation of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (The Nature of Things).
Stallings was born and raised in Decatur, Georgia and studied classics at the University of Georgia, and the University of Oxford. She is an editor with the Atlanta Review. In 1999, Stallings moved to Athens, Greece and has lived there ever since. She is the Poetry Program Director of the Athens Centre. She is married to John Psaropoulos, who is the editor of the Athens News.
Stallings' poetry uses traditional forms, and she has been associated with the New Formalism.
She is a frequent contributor of poems and essays to Poetry magazine. She has published three books of original verse, Archaic Smile (1999), Hapax (2006), and Olives (2012). In 2007 she published a verse translation of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (The Nature of Things).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews
August 29, 2024
One of the best poets writing today. Stallings is eloquent and innovative, but also works in traditional forms and brings deep craft to each poem. This is a great sampling of her work, and those who enjoy poetry that rewards close reading will find delight in the poems.
April 16, 2025
"And part of you leaves Tartarus,
But part stays there to dwell—
You who are both Orpheus
And She he left in Hell."
But part stays there to dwell—
You who are both Orpheus
And She he left in Hell."
February 22, 2023
Stallings finds meaning in objects and circumstances that we are all familiar with and that we typically ignore. As stated in the blurb on the back -- "Her poems come out of life's dailiness." Her perspective reveals the extraordinary in the ordinary and triggers explosions of recollection and association. Her well-imaged insights (not her stylistic perfection) will bring me back repeatedly to these poems.
I want more. Please give me more.
A few of the many lines that delighted me:
"We fall mute, as when two lovers come
To the brink of the apology, and half,
Each sanding on the wrong side of the fault." p. 31
"Orpheus struck dumb with hindsight." p. 46
about bats
"But travel by a sort of song that rings
True not in utterance, but harkenings,
Who find their way by calling into darkness
to hear their voice bounce off the shape of things." p. 55
"Here comes a freight train nosing west,
Pulling the dawn behind her." p. 57
"Nothing is more permanent than the temporary." p. 113
From Lost and Found, the longest of the poems pp. 120- 153
"The hours drained as women rearrange
The furniture in search of small, lost change."
"Don't ask
The mind to rest, though someday it must cease;
In life, only the flesh has any peace."
"Beneath a black sky thrilled with stars ..."
"Those are the frayed, lost threads
Of conversations, arguments, the yarn
Of thought and logic's clews we'd thought we'd spun
Only to find they'd somehow come undone."
A description of sea urchins --
like mermaid doubloons,
these rose-, mauve-, pistachio-
tinted macaroons." p. 165
Silence is
"the room
In which melody moves, the medium
Through which thought travels ...
Before the word itself, it was the womb.
It has a measure. Music calls it rest." p. 170
"And yet I rise
Hearing the typing of the rain." p. 178
"But it isn't the unfathomable fall
That makes me giddy, makes my stomach lurch,
It's that the ledge itself invents the leap." p. 181
"Twisted the bulb out to turn on the dark." p. 186
I want more. Please give me more.
A few of the many lines that delighted me:
"We fall mute, as when two lovers come
To the brink of the apology, and half,
Each sanding on the wrong side of the fault." p. 31
"Orpheus struck dumb with hindsight." p. 46
about bats
"But travel by a sort of song that rings
True not in utterance, but harkenings,
Who find their way by calling into darkness
to hear their voice bounce off the shape of things." p. 55
"Here comes a freight train nosing west,
Pulling the dawn behind her." p. 57
"Nothing is more permanent than the temporary." p. 113
From Lost and Found, the longest of the poems pp. 120- 153
"The hours drained as women rearrange
The furniture in search of small, lost change."
"Don't ask
The mind to rest, though someday it must cease;
In life, only the flesh has any peace."
"Beneath a black sky thrilled with stars ..."
"Those are the frayed, lost threads
Of conversations, arguments, the yarn
Of thought and logic's clews we'd thought we'd spun
Only to find they'd somehow come undone."
A description of sea urchins --
like mermaid doubloons,
these rose-, mauve-, pistachio-
tinted macaroons." p. 165
Silence is
"the room
In which melody moves, the medium
Through which thought travels ...
Before the word itself, it was the womb.
It has a measure. Music calls it rest." p. 170
"And yet I rise
Hearing the typing of the rain." p. 178
"But it isn't the unfathomable fall
That makes me giddy, makes my stomach lurch,
It's that the ledge itself invents the leap." p. 181
"Twisted the bulb out to turn on the dark." p. 186
March 15, 2023
I loved these sharp smart poems.
February 18, 2023
I don't usually read poetry, and when I do it is either because I enjoy the aesthetic of the form, or because I relate to it. Somehow Stallings' selected poems did both. Maybe it was studying Greek, or being raised in the Aegean. I found myself feeling a certain warmth as if the sun was out. I felt like I could hear the cicadas and smell the salt of the sea drying on my skin. And I was reading this book on a particularly gloomy Cambridge morning.
I made note of the poems that I would like to read again. Since I borrowed this book from the library it will have to go back.
A Postcard from Greece, Cardinal Numbers, Homecoming, Consolation for Tamar, The Mistake, Study in White, Aftershocks, Thyme, Asphodel, Another Lullaby for Insomniacs, Four Fibs, After a Greek Proverb, Denouement, Dying the Easter Eggs, Like, the Sestina, Sea Urchins, Shattered, Learning to Read Greek.
I made note of the poems that I would like to read again. Since I borrowed this book from the library it will have to go back.
A Postcard from Greece, Cardinal Numbers, Homecoming, Consolation for Tamar, The Mistake, Study in White, Aftershocks, Thyme, Asphodel, Another Lullaby for Insomniacs, Four Fibs, After a Greek Proverb, Denouement, Dying the Easter Eggs, Like, the Sestina, Sea Urchins, Shattered, Learning to Read Greek.
January 27, 2023
2 out of 5 stars.
This poetry collection was not for me but if you like fantasy and mythology-based poetry this would be amazing for you. I went out of my set of taste by picking this up and regretted it because I really just didn't enjoy the story aspect of this. The writing was a bit confusing for me at times as well, but there were a few poems I really did enjoy, they just didn't shine over the rest of the collection though.
Disclaimer: I received a digital arc copy of this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
This poetry collection was not for me but if you like fantasy and mythology-based poetry this would be amazing for you. I went out of my set of taste by picking this up and regretted it because I really just didn't enjoy the story aspect of this. The writing was a bit confusing for me at times as well, but there were a few poems I really did enjoy, they just didn't shine over the rest of the collection though.
Disclaimer: I received a digital arc copy of this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
May 23, 2023
This is a great collection, and I enjoyed it for the most part, but I think the placement of certain poems felt a bit off. Then again, different moods, different days. I'd still recommend this as one to dip into. Absolutely.
November 28, 2024
Stallings is one of my favourite poets. The way the words drip in these poems is excellent. It's truly like reading a piece of art. This is a collection to be savoured, read over a week in little, digestible chunks.
June 8, 2024
“In love, we are all debtors”
:-)
:-)
July 15, 2024
A strange mix for me - many of the poems left me cold - but the ones that grabbed me were beyond excellent.
February 10, 2023
There were some really gorgeous lines, such as "Though at times I feel the trees, rocking in place / Like grief, clenching the dirt." Unfortunately, I'm not wholly one for whom form works; the rhyme decenters me from other beauties in the language. I appreciated the craft, however, quite deeply. AE Stallings is remarkable, and if you have a love for allusions in poetry or well structured pieces, this would be a lovely book for you.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher who gave me an advanced reader's copy in exchange for an honest review.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher who gave me an advanced reader's copy in exchange for an honest review.
November 19, 2023
This collection was phenomenal. It had an insane amount of references that I felt aided rather than hurt. 100% recommend for poetry lovers or Greek lovers!
May 20, 2025
Video review https://youtu.be/5AH_MNeV0pg
December 9, 2022
This Afterlife is a collection of poems (and a few translations) from A. E. Stallings ranging from 1999 to within the past few years. That’s a good few decades worth of work, but Stallings I admit is new to me (not that this is saying much, my poetry reading is sporadic at best). But I’ll be checking out other books by this author after reading these selected poems.
Many, most at a rough guess and especially so of the early works, of the poems have a connection to classical myths, as even a cursory glance simply at the titles will tell you, a few of which include: “Hades Welcomes His Bride”, “Persephone Writes a Letter to Her Mother”, “Medea, Homesick, and “Persephone to Psyche”.
One certainly doesn’t need a working knowledge of Greek/Roman myth to appreciate the poems’ language, structured meter and rhyme, or most of their sharper points, though it’s also true some such knowledge will make for a richer experience. It’s also true that most of these myth-based poems aren’t located solely in ancient times or experience, but instead are a melding of the ancient and the modern, sometimes literally so — moving back and forth between the two in setting or language or both — and sometimes more in thought or theme.
In “First Love: A Quiz” for instance, one of the more playfully experimental poems, written int eh form of a multiple-choice test, we get the typical “bad boy” appeal: “He came up to me/in his souped-up Camaro”. But these “answers” of the test are juxtaposed with other answers such as, “He came to me/from the ground, in a lead chariot drawn by a/team of stallion . . . /breathing sulfur”
One of my personal favorite is the aforementioned Persephone Writes a Letter to Her Mother”, written of course from Hades which is “not so far underground”, so near in fact the surface that Persephone “can just make out the crunch of footsteps/The pop of acorns falling, or the chime/Of a shovel squaring a fresh grave or turning/Up the tulip bulbs for separation.” Note the melding of life and death, as well as the careful attention to sound — the “O” of “pop, “of” “shovel”; the “u”, the “t” and more.
Stallings also presents the reader with an unexpected Hades (the god, not the place), something she does multiple times in these poems, as in “Arachne Gives Thanks to Athena”, where the old tale of Arachne being cursed by the goddess is, in Arachne’s own voice, “no punishment. They are mistaken/… My prayers were answered.” I won’t spoil the poem’s close, save to say it is as beautiful as it is unexpected.
The poems not centered on classical myths often focus on the domestic realm: parenting, a busted washing machine, a cast iron skillet needing to be reseasoned. I confess I found these less satisfying generally: not as sharply edged, a bit too neatly rounded off especially at the closes, but that’s not true for all of them, and the word/sound play remains consistently high throughout.
I’m typically satisfied when half the poems or short stories in a collection speak to me ins some fashion and am thrilled at three-quarters. This Afterlife easily cleared that bar. I’d also say it’s an excellent book for non-poetry readers in that the poems, despite their possibly intimidating classical foundation, are absolutely accessible and, in their rhyme and structure, perhaps a more familiar form. An excellent choice for people looking to dip perhaps hesitantly into poetry or for a gift for your reader friend who “doesn’t do poetry.” Highly recommended.
Many, most at a rough guess and especially so of the early works, of the poems have a connection to classical myths, as even a cursory glance simply at the titles will tell you, a few of which include: “Hades Welcomes His Bride”, “Persephone Writes a Letter to Her Mother”, “Medea, Homesick, and “Persephone to Psyche”.
One certainly doesn’t need a working knowledge of Greek/Roman myth to appreciate the poems’ language, structured meter and rhyme, or most of their sharper points, though it’s also true some such knowledge will make for a richer experience. It’s also true that most of these myth-based poems aren’t located solely in ancient times or experience, but instead are a melding of the ancient and the modern, sometimes literally so — moving back and forth between the two in setting or language or both — and sometimes more in thought or theme.
In “First Love: A Quiz” for instance, one of the more playfully experimental poems, written int eh form of a multiple-choice test, we get the typical “bad boy” appeal: “He came up to me/in his souped-up Camaro”. But these “answers” of the test are juxtaposed with other answers such as, “He came to me/from the ground, in a lead chariot drawn by a/team of stallion . . . /breathing sulfur”
One of my personal favorite is the aforementioned Persephone Writes a Letter to Her Mother”, written of course from Hades which is “not so far underground”, so near in fact the surface that Persephone “can just make out the crunch of footsteps/The pop of acorns falling, or the chime/Of a shovel squaring a fresh grave or turning/Up the tulip bulbs for separation.” Note the melding of life and death, as well as the careful attention to sound — the “O” of “pop, “of” “shovel”; the “u”, the “t” and more.
Stallings also presents the reader with an unexpected Hades (the god, not the place), something she does multiple times in these poems, as in “Arachne Gives Thanks to Athena”, where the old tale of Arachne being cursed by the goddess is, in Arachne’s own voice, “no punishment. They are mistaken/… My prayers were answered.” I won’t spoil the poem’s close, save to say it is as beautiful as it is unexpected.
The poems not centered on classical myths often focus on the domestic realm: parenting, a busted washing machine, a cast iron skillet needing to be reseasoned. I confess I found these less satisfying generally: not as sharply edged, a bit too neatly rounded off especially at the closes, but that’s not true for all of them, and the word/sound play remains consistently high throughout.
I’m typically satisfied when half the poems or short stories in a collection speak to me ins some fashion and am thrilled at three-quarters. This Afterlife easily cleared that bar. I’d also say it’s an excellent book for non-poetry readers in that the poems, despite their possibly intimidating classical foundation, are absolutely accessible and, in their rhyme and structure, perhaps a more familiar form. An excellent choice for people looking to dip perhaps hesitantly into poetry or for a gift for your reader friend who “doesn’t do poetry.” Highly recommended.
January 17, 2023
"Every time I wield a knife, I cry.
He has become the onion of my eye."
A.E. Stallings is the poet of our time. Like Anne Carson, she brings forth classic texts, Greek tales and characters in ways that are lyrical, haunting, beautiful. She plays with words, plays with stories. Each poem is something entirely new and takes my breath away just about every time.
The first half of this collection was the strongest half to me, though this may be because the latter half relies more upon her understanding of child-/motherhood. Still, this collection is well-crafted and clearly written by a highly skilled poet.
He has become the onion of my eye."
A.E. Stallings is the poet of our time. Like Anne Carson, she brings forth classic texts, Greek tales and characters in ways that are lyrical, haunting, beautiful. She plays with words, plays with stories. Each poem is something entirely new and takes my breath away just about every time.
The first half of this collection was the strongest half to me, though this may be because the latter half relies more upon her understanding of child-/motherhood. Still, this collection is well-crafted and clearly written by a highly skilled poet.
November 17, 2024
I’ll be your willow tree
February 28, 2023
Come now, child, adjust your eyes, for sight/ Is here a lesser sense.
This Afterlife was my first time reading A.E. Stallings work, as I'm not the most avid poetry consumer. I took a few poetry classes for my Bachelor's (it was required) but my ability to connect with poetic works is really hit or miss. Luckily, this collection was largely a winner for me, though it certainly wasn't perfect.
Since This Afterlife is a collection of collections, pulled from different eras of the writer's life, the themes were varied but Greek culture and mythology provided a narrative thread throughout. Not every poem dealt with these topics, but enough did that it was recognizable.
There were some poems I didn't really connect with but that's going to be true of any collection. I did like how she varied the format of rhyme schemes, meters, traditional vs. open forms, etc.
Particular Favorites:
- Hades Welcomes His Bride
- How the Demons Were Assimilated & Became Productive Citizens
Odd Lines:
One of the recurring issues that keep me from being an avid poetry fan is the odd words and phrases poets will weave in occasionally. Here are a few of those phrases. Please note, this section is meant to be light-hearted, I'm not mocking the writer or providing critical commentary; possibly these lines are brilliant and I'm just dumb.
the sky, as bright as pain,...what?
Of form and entropy,...does entropy have form?
August 27, 2025
In her appearance on the Spectator’s Book Club podcast, Stallings talks about how the education in classics she got in the 1980s was much more useful for understanding the nuts and bolts of meter and poetic construction than her education in English. I don’t understand, and frankly don’t want to understand, what was being said in US universities’ English departments about poetic ‘form’ during the 80s and 90s: Stallings herself has written about this craziness, and how Britain thankfully escaped it. But the story was useful context for this Irish-British reader nonetheless, because it is her classicism that comes through much more than her ('new') formalism. I had to consult my Ovid more than a few times reading this collection to make sure I was understanding the point of a given line. And even when it comes to the poems (fewer in number than I had expected) that do not make explicit reference to the classics, they are pervaded with olive oil and libations and an overall atmosphere of Mediterranean paganism. ‘The Argument’ has stayed with me.
Read
December 31, 2024The incorporation of fantasy and mythology elements into this collection was really cool in a poetry format. I was immediately entranced by the idea of hell as shallow, Persephone’s hair getting tangled in the roots of trees in “Persephone Writes a Letter to her Mother”. Not every poem resonated with me, which made the reading process feel a bit stilted. But there were frequently poems that had me stopping and rereading, extracting as much from them as I could. This is the second book I’ve read this year that makes me want to read more Greek mythology; the stories are so cool.
Some of my other favorites are “Jet Lag”, “For Atalanta”, “Denouement”, and “Glitter”. I love poems that capture small moments of beauty: being up before the sun, unraveling a ball of yarn, daughters with glitter.
The longest poem, “Lost and Found”, was so interesting. The concept of everything that’s ever been lost collecting on the moon is cool, and what Stallings put there is even cooler. Piles of teeth, singular gloves, lost threads of conversations and ideas, gratitude, sleep. “Love notes unsent— in love, we are all debtors.”
Some of my other favorites are “Jet Lag”, “For Atalanta”, “Denouement”, and “Glitter”. I love poems that capture small moments of beauty: being up before the sun, unraveling a ball of yarn, daughters with glitter.
The longest poem, “Lost and Found”, was so interesting. The concept of everything that’s ever been lost collecting on the moon is cool, and what Stallings put there is even cooler. Piles of teeth, singular gloves, lost threads of conversations and ideas, gratitude, sleep. “Love notes unsent— in love, we are all debtors.”
February 22, 2023
Favorite Poems:
"A Lament for the Dead Pets of Our Childhood"
"Tour of the Labyrinth"
"The Mistake"
"The Machines Mourn the Passing of People"
"Ubi Sunt Lament for the Eccentric Museums of My Childhood"
"Asphodel"
"An Ancient Dog Grave, Unearthed During Construction of the Athens Metro"
"Explaining an Affinity for Bats"
"Prelude"
"Jigsaw Puzzle"
"Burned"
"Triolet on a Line Apocryphally Ascribed to Martin Luther"
"Accident Waiting to Happen"
"The Mother's Loathing of Balloons"
"Another Bedtime Story"
"Ajar"
"Glitter"
"The Last Carousel"
"Pencil"
"Placebo"
"Scissors"
"Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda"
"Silence"
"The Magi"
"After Reading the Biography Savage Beauty"
"A Lament for the Dead Pets of Our Childhood"
"Tour of the Labyrinth"
"The Mistake"
"The Machines Mourn the Passing of People"
"Ubi Sunt Lament for the Eccentric Museums of My Childhood"
"Asphodel"
"An Ancient Dog Grave, Unearthed During Construction of the Athens Metro"
"Explaining an Affinity for Bats"
"Prelude"
"Jigsaw Puzzle"
"Burned"
"Triolet on a Line Apocryphally Ascribed to Martin Luther"
"Accident Waiting to Happen"
"The Mother's Loathing of Balloons"
"Another Bedtime Story"
"Ajar"
"Glitter"
"The Last Carousel"
"Pencil"
"Placebo"
"Scissors"
"Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda"
"Silence"
"The Magi"
"After Reading the Biography Savage Beauty"
March 27, 2025
Stallings has what a good writer needs: A mix of beauty, truth, and caprice. Her poems evoke universal feelings; they do so with clever, wondrous, mellifluous phrases; and she's clearly having such a good time with her language all the while. So many writers are too self-serious: They are too engaged with Being Someone, with Saying Terribly Important Things. Stallings manages to say some fairly important things, but she never seems to lose sight of herself, of her own humanity. She's playing little games, making little puzzles, using language not just to communicate something but as a joy in its own right.
This collection? It's a treat.
This collection? It's a treat.
November 29, 2022
Received a copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
I thought this collection of poems would make a fantastic starter for those who aren't too sure where to begin. If they wanna dive a little deeper and start to really unravel the feelings behind a person.
They were refreshing yet overplayed and I think that held some of the beauty to me. It's easy to expect what's coming but sometimes that's what you need. All in all, I wouldn't read it again but I didn't regret it and the time I spent on it.
I thought this collection of poems would make a fantastic starter for those who aren't too sure where to begin. If they wanna dive a little deeper and start to really unravel the feelings behind a person.
They were refreshing yet overplayed and I think that held some of the beauty to me. It's easy to expect what's coming but sometimes that's what you need. All in all, I wouldn't read it again but I didn't regret it and the time I spent on it.
February 18, 2023
The poet does some deft and surprising things with enjambement, and especially with rhyme. She creates resonant metaphors and deals with the mythological content in a fresh and exciting way. I did feel some discomfort with the word choice in some of her poems. In her poem "Like, the Sestina," she articulates her rationale for avoiding obscure or pretentious vocabulary, and I respect that; and yet, sometimes the language comes across as trite or flat, and there are times when the auditory quality 0f the poem does not do justice to the beauty of the imagery. Still, an exciting discovery.
January 27, 2023
I read a poem of A. E. Stallings somewhere--in The Daily Slowdown from American Public Media or the weekly book newsletter from Washington Post's Ron Charles--and thought I would try this, her latest collection of selections from her various books. Her use of meter and rhyme drew me in, and I particularly liked the poems about her children, one about the Magi, and one about dyeing Easter eggs. For those who like Greek mythology there are many poems on that subject as well.
November 9, 2023
This collection of poems, mostly published previously, just delighted me. Stallings has a knack for mixing rhyme and pace—notably the insertion of abrupt, short lines—to make effects that are sometimes wry and sometimes lamenting. Her topics are sometimes mundane, even to the point of doing a jigsaw puzzle, but sometimes very thoughtful expressions of the difficulties of family life. Also a lot of classical references.
May 6, 2024
I've made an effort to read more poetry in the last couple of years with mixed results. Over the last month or so, I read a couple of poems a day from This Afterlife, astounded at their brilliance. A.E. Stallings plays with words and rhymes and metaphors and similes cleverly. She makes the mundane special with her poems about everyday objects and activities.
This collection showcases work from more than twenty years. Clearly over that time Stallings has mastered the form.
This collection showcases work from more than twenty years. Clearly over that time Stallings has mastered the form.
January 22, 2026
“The machines mourn the passing of the people” for some reason reverberated with me.
“We were kicked like dogs when we were broken,
But we did not whimper. We gritted our cogs—
An honor it was to be treated as dogs,
To incur such warm words roughly spoken,
The way that they pleaded with us if we balked—
“Come on, come on” in a hoarse whisper
As they would urge a reluctant lover—
The feel of their warm breath when they talked!”
“We were kicked like dogs when we were broken,
But we did not whimper. We gritted our cogs—
An honor it was to be treated as dogs,
To incur such warm words roughly spoken,
The way that they pleaded with us if we balked—
“Come on, come on” in a hoarse whisper
As they would urge a reluctant lover—
The feel of their warm breath when they talked!”
July 3, 2023
Author: A.E. Stallings
Date released: 2022
Category: Poetry Collection
Synopsis: Selected Poems brings together poetry from A. E. Stallings's four acclaimed collections, Archaic Smile, Hapax, Olives, and Like, as well as a lagniappe of outlier poems. Over time, themes and characters reappear, speaking to one another across years and experience, creating a complex music of harmony, dissonance, and counterpoint. The Underworld and the Afterlife, ancient history and the archaeology of the here and now, all slant rhyme with one another. Many of these poems unfold in the mytho-domestic sphere, through the eyes of Penelope or Pandora, the poet or Alice in Wonderland. Fulfilling the promise of the energy and sprezzatura of Stallings's earliest collection, her later technical accomplishment rises to meet the richness of lived experience: of marriage and motherhood, of a life lived in another language and country, of aging and mortality. Her chosen home of Greece adds layers of urgency to her fascination with Greek mythology; living in an epicenter of contemporary crises means that current events and ancient history are always rubbing shoulders in her poems.
Expert at traditional received forms, Stallings is also a poet of restless experiment, in cat's-cradle rhyme schemes, nonce stanzas, supple free verse, thematic variation, and metaphysical conceits. The pleasure of these poems, fierce and witty, melancholy and wise, lies in a timeless precision that will outlast the fickleness of fashion.
The UnReel Take:
Story: N/A
Writing: 7.0
Characters: N/A
Setting: 8.0
UnReel AR: 7.5
Bottom Line: This Afterlife was my first time reading A.E. Stallings work, as I'm not the most avid poetry consumer. I took a few poetry classes for my Bachelor's (it was required) but my ability to connect with poetic works is really hit or miss. Luckily, this collection was largely a winner for me, though it certainly wasn't perfect.
Since This Afterlife is a collection of collections, pulled from different eras of the writer's life, the themes were varied but Greek culture and mythology provided a narrative thread throughout. Not every poem dealt with these topics, but enough did that it was recognizable.
There were some poems I didn't really connect with but that's going to be true of any collection. I liked how she varied the format of rhyme schemes, meters, traditional vs. open forms, etc.
Particular Favorites:
·Hades Welcomes His Bride
·How the Demons Were Assimilated & Became Productive Citizens
Odd Lines:
One of the recurring issues that keep me from being an avid poetry fan is the odd words and phrases poets will weave in occasionally. Here are a few of those phrases. (Please note, this section is meant to be light-hearted, I'm not mocking the writer or providing critical commentary; possibly these lines are brilliant and I'm just dumb.)
·“the sky, as bright as pain,”… what?
·“Of form and entropy,”… does entropy have form?
Ideal Reading Location: All over the freaking place. Poetry collections, in my humble opinion, aren’t meant to be read in one sitting. Pick it up once a day and read through a poem or two wherever you’re at. See how the words hit you differently in different contexts.
Drink Pairing: See above answer but, given the Greek themes of this collection, I’m going to have to say Ouzo. Yamas!
See more reviews at the UnReel Take!
Date released: 2022
Category: Poetry Collection
Synopsis: Selected Poems brings together poetry from A. E. Stallings's four acclaimed collections, Archaic Smile, Hapax, Olives, and Like, as well as a lagniappe of outlier poems. Over time, themes and characters reappear, speaking to one another across years and experience, creating a complex music of harmony, dissonance, and counterpoint. The Underworld and the Afterlife, ancient history and the archaeology of the here and now, all slant rhyme with one another. Many of these poems unfold in the mytho-domestic sphere, through the eyes of Penelope or Pandora, the poet or Alice in Wonderland. Fulfilling the promise of the energy and sprezzatura of Stallings's earliest collection, her later technical accomplishment rises to meet the richness of lived experience: of marriage and motherhood, of a life lived in another language and country, of aging and mortality. Her chosen home of Greece adds layers of urgency to her fascination with Greek mythology; living in an epicenter of contemporary crises means that current events and ancient history are always rubbing shoulders in her poems.
Expert at traditional received forms, Stallings is also a poet of restless experiment, in cat's-cradle rhyme schemes, nonce stanzas, supple free verse, thematic variation, and metaphysical conceits. The pleasure of these poems, fierce and witty, melancholy and wise, lies in a timeless precision that will outlast the fickleness of fashion.
The UnReel Take:
Story: N/A
Writing: 7.0
Characters: N/A
Setting: 8.0
UnReel AR: 7.5
Bottom Line: This Afterlife was my first time reading A.E. Stallings work, as I'm not the most avid poetry consumer. I took a few poetry classes for my Bachelor's (it was required) but my ability to connect with poetic works is really hit or miss. Luckily, this collection was largely a winner for me, though it certainly wasn't perfect.
Since This Afterlife is a collection of collections, pulled from different eras of the writer's life, the themes were varied but Greek culture and mythology provided a narrative thread throughout. Not every poem dealt with these topics, but enough did that it was recognizable.
There were some poems I didn't really connect with but that's going to be true of any collection. I liked how she varied the format of rhyme schemes, meters, traditional vs. open forms, etc.
Particular Favorites:
·Hades Welcomes His Bride
·How the Demons Were Assimilated & Became Productive Citizens
Odd Lines:
One of the recurring issues that keep me from being an avid poetry fan is the odd words and phrases poets will weave in occasionally. Here are a few of those phrases. (Please note, this section is meant to be light-hearted, I'm not mocking the writer or providing critical commentary; possibly these lines are brilliant and I'm just dumb.)
·“the sky, as bright as pain,”… what?
·“Of form and entropy,”… does entropy have form?
Ideal Reading Location: All over the freaking place. Poetry collections, in my humble opinion, aren’t meant to be read in one sitting. Pick it up once a day and read through a poem or two wherever you’re at. See how the words hit you differently in different contexts.
Drink Pairing: See above answer but, given the Greek themes of this collection, I’m going to have to say Ouzo. Yamas!
See more reviews at the UnReel Take!
August 17, 2023
I do not read much poetry, but I have been captivated by these poems. Stallings sees so much in the minutiae of our lives, and uses very subtle classical allusions to add depth to her work.
Highly recommended.
Highly recommended.
February 9, 2024
I loved some of the poems in this book - there are several that I'll go back to and recommend to others. But in some, the rhymes just felt too intrusive - so I've ended up with very mixed feelings about AE Stallings.
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