Split Horizon

Thomas Lux is the author of such books as Sunday, Half Promised Land, and The Drowned River. His poetry has been fulfilling every expectation by penetrating deeper into the plain-spoken, saturnine, witty language that he virtually invented. In his latest literary poetry collection, Lux's level gaze, cool talk, weird rhythms, and quirky humor place him in a special territory - entirely original - of contemporary American poetry. These new poems, like Split Horizon itself, have unusual titles (Loudmouth Soup, Virgule,Each Startled Touch Returns the Touch Unstartled) and circle around their subjects in strange ways, most often dealing with the lonely oddity of the individual in a society that inflexibly ignores individuality.

This collection finds the extraordinary in the ordinary and the human in the absurd.

• A Singular Voice: Experience a master poet’s level gaze on the world, where weird rhythms and cool talk create an entirely original territory.
• Dark Humor: Discover a plain-spoken and saturnine wit that circles its subjects in strange ways, finding the punchline in life’s lonely oddities.
• Unconventional Language: From poems with unusual titles like ’Loudmouth Soup’ to language that is at once inventive and accessible.
• Philosophical Themes: Explore the profound tension between the individual and a society that inflexibly ignores individuality, a central theme woven throughout the collection.

THOMAS LUX holds the Bourne Chair in Poetry and is the director of the McEver Visiting Writers Program at Georgia Institute of Technology. He has been awarded three NEA grants and the Kingsley Tufts Award and is a former Guggenheim Fellow. He lives in Atlanta.