The Andrew Poems - Hardcover

Wagner, Shelly

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0896723194 ISBN 13: 9780896723191

Publisher: Texas Tech University Press, 1994

Synopsis

On a soft summer Virginia evening Shelly Wagner was pushing her five-year-old son in a tire swing in the backyard, idling away the hours between dinner and bedtime. She left him only for a moment, but when she returned Andrew had disappeared. He was found later that night, drowned in the river behind their home. From the depths of grief that followed, Wagner began to write poems—not as therapy, she says, but to see if she could express the range of her experience more fully than the published books she’d read. What emerged from Wagner’s quest is a volume of verse that has comforted and inspired thousands of parents, patients, and other determined survivors.These clear, unflinching poems wherein she evokes the life and death of her five-year-old son are moving and unforgettable. . . . You will remember Andrew as if you had known him, this delightful boy. —RUTH STONETreasureFollow my hand into this trunk.Examine for yourself its treasure.Lift and read the heavy wooden board,a scrap of lumberon which he scrawled his name—red letters, all capitals,the E backwards.In kindergarten he learnedto sign perfectly his many drawings,the jewels of his last will and testament.Try on his brilliant yellow sunglasses.See the world as he saw it—clearlyfull of hope.Slide your hand up the sleeveof his favorite red shirtas though you were to tickle him.He would laugh. You may cry.Finally, with utmost care,hold what he made in nursery school—a white plaster cast of his hand,fingers spread wide apartas though he were telling youhow old he would be when he died.

About this title

From the Back Cover

One after another...Shelly Wagner's poems reach out and unstrap us; we're forced head-on into the pathos, the overwhelming beauty, the sense of unbearable loss. And as we read on, the only cushioning restraints are the beauty of language, the aesthetic and emotional impact of poetry (which intensify feelings even more, of course). What saves us, then, as reader? How can we bear it? Why should we try to cope with such loss, until we might have to? If Aristotle was right, a drama like this arouses our pity and fear: compassion, as we empathize; and fear, as we identify with and realize that the grief overwhelming the characters might happen also to us.

About the Author

Shelly Wagner lives in Norfolk, Virginia, with her husband, John. Her poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Poetry East, ONTHEBUS, and TriQuarterly.

Edition details

• Publisher: Texas Tech University Press
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0896723194
• ISBN 13: 9780896723191
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 96