In her new collection, Earth, Mercy, Mary Rose O'Reilley sifts through the debris of human habitation -- pink thong sandals, curlers, broken televisions -- looking for a kind of junkyard grace: "Holiness enters again / turquoise fins, and the Cessna's carapace / lifts on its wind."
The first poem, "Genesis, " locates the reader in Edenic time, "in that humid and green / arrival, " while the last, "Watching the End of the World from Hovland, Minnesota, " gives nature a final word: "Morels on goat prairie gloat / in their blue light. Spruce / speaking of green on green." Between these points, any poem offers a threshold over which something unexpected may pass -- a ghost, an angel, or the yap of an insouciant dog alerting us to apocalypse.
Against all that threatens our survival, Earth, Mercy asserts the beauty of our poignantly sensual life.
- 96 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub
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Information
Subtopic
PoetryIndex
LiteratureTable of contents
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Genesis
- Eve’s Dog
- A Week without God, North Coast
- Woodsman
- Next to Nothing
- Lullaby of the Virgin Mary
- Ponies
- When Jesus Was Dying
- Abandoned Farm
- The Plain Speech
- The Bridal Shower
- Improving the Neighborhood
- That Last Time
- The Third Winter
- Stories of Water
- You Ask Me to Speak
- Nothing Special
- Warblers
- Lindens
- Old Lovers’ Aubade
- Thaw
- Confession
- Absolution
- Key Lime Pie
- Burning the House
- Trying to Get Home
- The Architect
- Earthquake
- The Workbench
- Blood
- Plum
- Epithalamium: Pebbles
- Advance Warning
- Weather
- Hospice
- I Dream about Houses
- Wash
- Becoming Conscious
- Education
- Role Models: Little Women
- Reunion Photos
- High School: Memento Mori
- Anorexia
- Sleeping with Atheists
- Learning America on the Empire Builder
- Saturdays in America
- The Apartment
- Photo: Father, Daughter, 1932
- Clearing Out the Dead
- Doctors
- A Memorial Image of the Angel of Death
- Cassandra at the Train
- Sellers Motivated
- Ghosts
- War Dogs
- Gifted
- Reaching the Basement
- Calling Them Home
- Women’s Prayers
- The Fisherman’s Wife
- Watching the End of the World from Hovland, Minnesota
- Naming Dogs
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Yes, you can access Earth, Mercy by Mary Rose O'Reilley in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Literature & Poetry. We have over 1.5 million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.