Why read Be With?

Book cover of Be With

Book description

Drawing from his experience as a translator, Forrest Gander includes in the first, powerfully elegiac section a version of a poem by the Spanish mystical poet St. John of the Cross. He continues with a long multilingual poem examining the syncretic geological and cultural history of the U.S. border with…

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Poetry

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Why read it?

1 author picked Be With as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

David John Rosenheim

Author

My experience of reading this book is wooly, smokey, visceral, and consuming. His poetry takes a microscope to the guts, the excrement, the feel underfoot of the natural world. Just as he takes me into the detailed realm of the beech tree or lizard, he swoops me into the emotional feel-scape of loss, grief, belonging, and isolation.

Gander’s use of language is relatable and also stark, new, and encyclopedic. This book is perhaps his most famous work, having earned him a Pulitzer. It is condensed and distilled as rare bitters; open the bottle and let its pungent spirit subsume you.

From David's list on poetry to awaken your senses in the natural world.