In this Book
- In the Kingdom of the Ditch
- Book
- 2013
- Published by: Michigan State University Press
summary
In poetry that is at once accessible and finely crafted, Todd Davis maps the mysterious arc between birth and death, celebrating the beauty and pain of our varied entrances and exits, while taking his readers into the deep forests and waterways of the northeastern United States. With an acute sensibility for language unlike any other working poet, Davis captures the smallest nuances in the flowers, trees, and animals he encounters through a daily life spent in the field. Davis draws upon stories and myths from Christian, Transcendental, and Buddhist traditions to explore the intricacies of the spiritual and physical world we too often overlook. In celebrating the abundant life he finds in a ditch—replete with Queen Anne’s lace and milkweed, raspberries and blackberries, goldenrod and daisies—Davis suggests that life is consistently transformed, resurrected by what grows out of the fecundity of our dying bodies. In his fourth collection the poet, praised by The Bloomsbury Review, Arts & Letters, and many others, provides not only a taxonomy of the flora and fauna of his native Pennsylvania but also a new way of speaking about the sacred walk we make with those we love toward the ultimate mystery of death.
Table of Contents
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- I.
- Perspective
- pp. 5-18
- Consciousness: An Assay
- pp. 7-8
- Dona Nobis Pacem
- pp. 9-22
- Seeing Things
- pp. 10-23
- The Consolation of Wind
- pp. 11-24
- Deer Dreaming Me
- pp. 13-26
- A Mennonite in the Garden
- pp. 18-19
- What Lives in the Wake of Our Sleep
- pp. 21-34
- Two Sounds after an October Storm
- pp. 22-35
- Resurrection: A Field Note
- pp. 23-36
- Morning Poem
- pp. 24-37
- The Knowledge of the Lord
- pp. 25-38
- The Gospel of Beauty
- pp. 26-39
- Atrial Fibrillation
- pp. 32-45
- What We Do while We’re Dying
- pp. 33-46
- Begging Bowl
- pp. 34-47
- II.
- Dreaming the Dark Smell of Bear
- pp. 45-58
- Thoreau Considers a Stone
- pp. 46-59
- Emptying the Bedpan
- pp. 47-60
- Give Us Th is Day
- pp. 48-61
- In the Clear-cut
- pp. 51-64
- The Virtues of Indolence
- pp. 52-65
- Thoreau Surveys the Ice
- pp. 54-67
- In the Kingdom of the Ditch
- pp. 55-68
- Heaven Come Flying
- pp. 56-69
- Thoreau, in Death
- pp. 57-70
- Consecrated
- pp. 58-71
- III.
- Not Writing, Then Writing Again
- pp. 61-74
- Hawks Flying
- pp. 63-76
- When the Body Is Absent
- pp. 64-77
- Three Songs for Flannery O’Connor
- pp. 66-68
- Ordinary Time
- pp. 70-83
- Spring Melt
- pp. 71-84
- The Sound of Sunlight
- pp. 72-73
- Last of the Sea
- pp. 75-88
- Missing Boy
- pp. 76-89
- Heliotropic
- pp. 79-92
- Crow Counsels Me in the Ways of Love
- pp. 81-94
- Deposition
- pp. 82-83
- Somnambulance
- pp. 85-98
- Transfiguration
- pp. 86-87
- Last Bones of Winter
- pp. 88-101
- Meditation on Hunger at 2 a.m.
- pp. 92-105
- I’ll Catch You Up
- pp. 93-107
- Acknowledgments
- pp. 95-97
- About the Author
- p. 113
Additional Information
ISBN
9781609173562
Related ISBN(s)
9781611860702, 9781628950434, 9781628960433
MARC Record
OCLC
847007071
Pages
112
Launched on MUSE
2013-08-13
Language
English
Open Access
No