The Committee of Men (Paperback)

James Ciano’s debut collection, The Committee of Men, explores the cycles of violence men inflict on one another and themselves, examining how silence, shame, and inherited expectations shape masculine identity. Rooted in the speaker’s experience as a college athlete from a family of athletes—including a father who is a high school football coach—these poems confront the emotional weight of tradition and the often-unspoken struggles of male intimacy, mental illness, and familial pressure.

Through sharp lyricism and emotional honesty, Ciano delves into themes of belonging and exile, accountability and forgiveness, and the quiet damage done by historically unexamined masculinity, asking what it means to break these generational cycles without severing connection, and how healing might emerge in places where vulnerability is discouraged or denied. The result is a collection that is both unflinching and deeply humane—an urgent, resonant debut that refuses to look away.

The Committee of Men also includes a foreword by acclaimed poet David St. John, whose introduction situates Ciano’s work within a broader conversation about masculinity and poetic tradition, and underscores the collection’s emotional depth and significance.

The Committee of Men (brothers)

Three brothers   small brothers   in the yard   the basement

broken barstool over a back   teeth white   moon white

moon like a hole burnt through a black feather 

muddy brothers running in a pack   punching

open the door latch   the stairs   palms on the stairs 

no lights on   brothers with sticks   brothers beating

fists against the table   hungry brothers   brothers holding 

other brothers in the night   names of brothers

swimming in the summer   on bicycles   in beds of trucks

brothers wrestling in the boiler room   asleep on the floor 

brothers hiding brothers under the sofa   soft brothers

with bats   bloody brothers running home from the park 

running to the park away from home   laughing brothers 

in branches   brothers bandaged in front of box fans 

the cat the brothers find hit by the car   the bag 

the brothers place it in and bury in the yard