WORLD'S TALLEST DISASTER

Chosen by Robert Pinsky (who provides a foreword) for the press's first book prize, this taut, defiant, confessional collection implicates the reader in the speaker's misdeeds and misguidedness: "Reader, it was the funniest thing—/ after you left... / ...they called security." Marvin wields monotone vitriol ("Let me thank the lake that drowns you, the sun/ that makes your face old") and remote, albeit painful, embroilment ("Our lungs are blue/ from breathing that color.// Our faces wear the same/ expression. The sky is incapable of anything bluer./ Our hearts cannot be redder") like bludgeons. (Aug.)