The Law of Truly Large Numbers: Poems (Pitt Poetry Series) - Softcover

Kimbrell, James

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0822967375 ISBN 13: 9780822967378

Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2025

Synopsis

<i>The Law of Truly Large Numbers</i> is a book about coming to terms with loss and the arrival of unexpected, perhaps undeserved, love. Based on the statistical principle that in a truly large sample set anything outrageous is likely to happen, this book explores not only the outrageous things that have already happened—the loss of siblings and parents; the loss of home, friends, and relatives; the weight of illness and physical aging—but also the discovery and rediscovery of friendship as well as romantic and familial connections. Often locating themselves where mourning and celebration, grief and humor intersect, these poems consider the sometimes unexpected ways in which grief might open new channels for understanding and, ultimately, for love.

About this title

About the Author

<b>James Kimbrell</b> is the author of <i>Smote</i>, <i>The Gatehouse Heaven</i>, and <i>My Psychic</i> and the cotranslator of <i>Three Poets of Modern Korea: </i><i>Yi Sang, Hahm Dong-Seon, and Choi Young-Mi</i>. He has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Ruth Lilly Fellowship, the Discovery/<i>The Nation</i> Prize, a Whiting Award, the John and Renee Grisham Fellowship, the Florida Book Award, the Bess Hokin Prize from <i>Poetry Magazine</i>, and two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts. A native of Mississippi, he now serves as distinguished research professor at Florida State University.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

<b>Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.</b><br><b>Excerpt from The Law of Truly Large Numbers: Poems by James Kimbrell</b><br><br><br>SELF-PORTRAIT AS THIEF CONFESSING AFTER THE FACT <br><br>At Jr. Mart, one eye on the mirror, I<br>wedge my meal between skin and waistband.<br>A quick shake of my leg and the microwave<br>cheeseburger, cold as Nebraska, slips<br>down my thigh behind my knee, trending<br>south to the elastic cuff of my sweats.<br>No one suspects an ankle. And my ankle’s fat<br>when I step into the parking lot, not<br>looking back, two ounces of frozen beef<br>with its dinky stamp of American cheese<br>and a few gelid squares of diced onion<br>thawing slowly against my calf. July<br>sunlight on the gas pumps. Concrete dotted<br>with dark wads of abandoned gum.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
• Publication date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0822967375
• ISBN 13: 9780822967378
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 96