The University of Wisconsin Press


Poetry


 

Jagged with Love
Susanna Childress

The Brittingham Prize in Poetry
Ronald Wallace, General Editor



Winner of the 2005 Brittingham Prize in Poetry
—Selected by Billy Collins

Susanna Childress writes with an earnest desire to understand things physical and things spiritual. What results is a first collection of provocative, honest poetry that explores various human predicaments: a cancer-ridden wife, an explosive father, an infertile couple, various sexual aggressors, a missing girl. Such careful portraiture provokes the reader to consider the complexity of human love: how selfishness, fear, lust, and even brutality might coincide with tenderness and loyalty. Childress's writing is refreshingly naive and clear, her voice essentially inquisitive. She is brave enough to look at the darkness of the world, but she is more courageous to hope.

"She is a thousand pieces, scraped together. Debutantes,
all. This holy water. His arms, each like men
themselves, bustling under the whole skin
of the arms, strong solid men, she wants to pull them
together, dry skin, dry dark skin, arms like men."
—excerpt from "Supernova Love Shah"

"She writes with grace about love and lust, and she unfailingly delivers rhythmic and linguistic pleasures to her lucky readers as they follow the course of these inquisitive, unpredictable poems."—Billy Collins

Susanna Childress is finishing her Ph.D. in creative writing at Florida State University and this is her first book. She lives in Tallahassee.

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The  cover of Jagged with Love is divided into thirds, the top third is beige, with the title in white, the bottom 2/3s is an orange fabric design, with a torn edge

November 2005
LC: 2005010079 PS
80 pp. 6 x 9

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Paper $14.95 t
ISBN 978-0-299-21264-3
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