Read and discuss a book of poems with others who appreciate poetry and like to take a closer look at form, structure, and craft. Discussions will be lively and interactive, and participants will have a chance to share thoughts and ask questions. Come prepared to read favorite poems, lines, and passages from the book aloud. October’s selection is OBIT by Victoria Chang. The discussion will be led by Erin Rodoni.

After her mother died, poet Victoria Chang refused to write elegies. Rather, she distilled her grief during a feverish two weeks by writing scores of poetic obituaries for all she lost in the world. In Obit, longlisted for the 2020 National Book Award in Poetry, Chang writes of “the way memory gets up after someone has died and starts walking.” These poems reinvent the form of newspaper obituary to both name what has died (“civility,” “language,” “the future,” “Mother’s blue dress”) and the cultural impact of death on the living. Whereas elegy attempts to immortalize the dead, an obituary expresses loss, and the love for the dead becomes a conduit for self-expression. In this unflinching and lyrical book, Chang meets her grief and creates a powerful testament for the living.

ERIN RODONI is the author of three poetry collections, most recently And If the Woods Carry You, winner of the Southern Indiana Review Michael Waters Poetry Prize and finalist for the Northern California Book Award. She was awarded the 2017 Montreal International Poetry Prize, and her poems have been published or are forthcoming in Blackbird, Fairy Tale Review, North American Review, and Terrain.org, among others. She teaches and mentors through the Writing Salon.