Meme : poems / by Susan Wheeler.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Wheeler, Susan, 1955-

Series:

Kuhl House poets

Language:

English

Genre:

Poetry.

Physical Description:

87 pages ; 21 cm.

Place of Publication:

Iowa City : University of Iowa Press, [2012]

Summary:

Acclaimed poet Susan Wheeler, whose last individual collection predicted the spiritual losses of the economic collapse, turns her attention to the most intimate of subjects: the absence or loss of love. A meme is a unit of thought replicated by imitation; examples of memes, Richard Dawkins wrote, "are tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches." Occupy Wall Street is a meme, as are internet ideas and images that go viral. What could be more potent memes than those passed down by parents to their children? Wheeler reconstructs her mother's voice--down to its cynicism and its mid twentieth-century midwestern vernacular--in "The Maud Poems," a voice that takes a more aggressive, vituperative turn in "The Devil--or--The Introjects." In the book's third long sequence, a generational inheritance feeds cultural transmission in "The Split." A set of variations on losses and break-ups--wildly, darkly funny throughout and, in places, devastatingly sad--"The Split" brings Wheeler's lauded inventiveness, wit, and insight to the profound loss of love. One read, and the meme "Should I stay or should I go?" will be altered in your head forever.

Contents:

The Maud poems

The devil or the introjects

The split.

ISBN:

9781609381271

1609381270

9781609381424

1609381424

OCLC:

775780161