Dialogues with Rising Tides

In her piercing fourth collection, Agodon (Hourglass Museum) explores intertwined anxieties—a family history of mental illness, looming environmental collapse, the inadequacies of love—with care and understated humor. In “Unsustainable,” she addresses a lover with foreboding and whimsy: “I want to keep you in my plastic/ Happy Meal heart, but what snaps open// stays on Earth forever, my center floating/ down a canal until it’s swallowed by a seal.” She vacillates between exploring family trauma and moments of genuine joy: “how once/ in Mexico, after I lost my wedding ring,/ I did a body shot off a woman/ I didn’t know and how sticky she was/ and how the tequila made the night a little quieter/ and the stars made the beach feel like a church.” Agodon has a talent for arresting titles. In “Magpies Recognize Themselves in the Mirror,” bystanders at a mall watch with understanding as a woman experiences a mental health crisis: “And like that/ we were her flock in our black coats/ and white sweaters, some of us reaching our/ wings to her and some of us flying away.” Despite the tragedies at the center of this book, Agodon captures the universality of dark emotions and offers a collection full of hope. (Apr.)