Tough Luck

Starred review from April 15, 2017

Boss (Yellowrocket; Pitch) made a splash on the contemporary poetry scene with his first two collections; he also represents that rarely found phenomenon, a poet whose habitat is not the academy. This new collection revolves around an elegiac sequence that addresses the collapse of the I-35W Bridge in Minneapolis. The lasting pieces are likely to be neither the heartfelt, ribbonlike outcries nor the rather bitter divorce poems but the skilled lyrics that riff brilliantly on our stalest phrases ("When My Mother Says Tough Luck"; "A Little Hard Work Won't Kill Ya") and the palpable textures of poems such as "A Hoard of Driftwood" and "A Bouquet," or the surprising delicacy of "Soon I Wake Among New Hills." Boss's "Eve" (yes, that Eve, and a sonnet in couplets, no less) demonstrates the power of his sympathies in concert with his surprising music, rich and graceful at one go--this poem alone is worth the price of admission. VERDICT Boss is a poet to watch, likely to prove one of the leading voices of the next decade. Readers may be drawn into this collection for the poems that touch on disaster and divorce, but they'll stay for the memorable verses on nature and memory.--Graham Christian, formerly with Andover-Harvard Theological Lib., Cambridge, MA

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