Tracy K. Smith

Presents the third collection of new poems by the Pulitzer-prize-winning poet.

Poems

Life on Mars

It was as expansive and surprising as I had anticipated, and I’m glad I’m reading this 5 years after I first got my copy. Smith’s ability to illustrate the vastness of life and the universe in some poems and simultaneously make tender and intimate this grandness in others is astounding to me. Obviously deserved the Pulitzer, no doubts there. Not a perfect 5 since I don’t know how much I’ll find myself coming back to it, but we’ll see if that changes.

Carmen

The Sealey Challenge Book 1!

It was as expansive and surprising as I had anticipated, and I’m glad I’m reading this 5 years after I first got my copy. Smith’s ability to illustrate the vastness of life and the universe in some poems and simultaneously make tender and intimate this grandness in others is astounding to me. Obviously deserved the Pulitzer, no doubts there. Not a perfect 5 since I don’t know how much I’ll find myself coming back to it, but we’ll see if that changes.

Winner of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize * Poet Laureate of the United States * * A New York Times Notable Book of 2011 and New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice * * A New Yorker, Library Journal and Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year * New poetry by the award-winning poet Tracy K. Smith, whose "lyric brilliance and political impulses never falter" (Publishers Weekly, starred review) You lie there kicking like a baby, waiting for God himself To lift you past the rungs of your crib. What Would your life say if it could talk? —from "No Fly Zone" With allusions to David Bowie and interplanetary travel, Life on Mars imagines a soundtrack for the universe to accompany the discoveries, failures, and oddities of human existence. In these brilliant new poems, Tracy K. Smith envisions a sci-fi future sucked clean of any real dangers, contemplates the dark matter that keeps people both close and distant, and revisits the kitschy concepts like "love" and "illness" now relegated to the Museum of Obsolescence. These poems reveal the realities of life lived here, on the ground, where a daughter is imprisoned in the basement by her own father, where celebrities and pop stars walk among us, and where the poet herself loses her father, one of the engineers who worked on the Hubble Space Telescope. With this remarkable third collection, Smith establishes herself among the best poets of her generation.

Molly M

almost exactly what i’ve been looking for. probably would have rocked me if i were a david bowie fan lol so i highly recommend this book to any of u who are

charisa

not every poem in this collection hit for me personally, but the ones that did felt like a punch. smith's writing is scintillating and generous (and probably a little too smart for me at times lmao). she alternates between taking you far above, hovering in the deep coldness of space, and ushering you through a thread of current events, reliving the bite and grace of human relationship. 

favorites: 
my god, it's full of stars 
the universe is a house party
savior machine
the 1st page of the speed of belief
us & co

Alexa Jade

I don’t even know what to say. I just found myself underwhelmed and slightly confused through this book.

madina

4.5. i definitely liked some parts of the book better than the others & as i read more poetry i realize how my feelings on it are definitely subjective to what imagery i like in poetry! that's probably why i love part one so much. but as a whole this book was amazing & a testament to tracy k smith's poet laureate title.

Andrada D

I'm sure this is an amazing, praise worthy book but it wasn't for me. I dragged it for half a year and we haven't clicked even once...

Life on Mars Poems

Reviews