Manyebook

A Small Story about the Sky

In his thirteenth book, Alberto Rios casts an intense desert light on the rich stories unfolding along the Mexico-US border. Peppered with Spanish and touches of magical realism, ordinary life and its simple props — morning showers, spilled birdseed, winter lemons — becomes an exploration of mortality and humanity, and the many possibilities of how lives might yet be lived.

Mad Honey

Made from magnificent rhododendron, poisonous rhododendron,

Very difficult-to-pronounce rhododendron — whatever

Rhododendron even is — I would have to look it up myself,

This word sounding puffed up, peacocky with its

Indianapolisly-long spelling, all those letters moving in and out.

But the plant itself, the plant and the bees that find it:

The bees see in its purple flower, first, a purple flower.

They do not spell it. They do not live in fear of quizzes,

Purple offering what it has to offer, unapologetic, without further

Definition, purple irresistible to the artist's and to the bee's eye—

Who can blame either one this first-grade impulse toward love?

Purple, always wearing something low-cut ...

Alberto Rios is the Poet Laureate of Arizona and host of the PBS program Books & Co. He was a finalist for the National Book Award for his poetry volume The Smallest Muscle in the Human Body. He teaches at Arizona State University and lives in Chandler, Arizona.

  • Format
  • paperback
  • Pages
  • 125
  • Language
  • english
  • ISBN
  • 9781556594793
  • Genres
  • poetry, contemporary
  • Release date
  • 2015