Together in a Sudden Strangeness

Starred review from November 1, 2020

Poets may labor weeks, months, even years to perfect the gems they give us, but a crisis as large as the current pandemic calls for immediate response--and got it. Former poetry editor at The New Yorker, Quinn gathered the 85 poems in this collection in 40 days, starting on March 27. (Though the pitch-perfect title is taken from Pablo Neruda, all the poets are American by design.) The result shows some of America's best poets snapshotting the moment to provide both immediate identification and long-term understanding. "He's working nights, learning all the ways/ a body's nerves can light & link & fail," says Suzanne Gardiner of a rookie neurologist, while John Koethe says of sheltering in place, "I hate it--but then home/ Was always a place to depart from/ Or come back to, not a state of being in itself." Elsewhere, the pandemic remains oblique, with poets waxing philosophical; observes Carl Phillips, "The dogwood brandished those pollen-laden buds/ that precede a flowering. History. What survives, or doesn't." VERDICT Diane Seuss rightly proclaims, "I don't want to find meaning in it," but Quinn's collection provides a lifeline--and food for thought. [Released as an ebook in June 2020.]

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