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Brute
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
11 posts | 9 read | 14 to read
Selected by Joy Harjo as the winner of the Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets Emily Skajas debut collection is a fiery, hypnotic book that confronts the dark questions and menacing silences around gender, sexuality, and violence. Brute arises, brave and furious, from the dissolution of a relationship, showing how such endings necessitate self-discovery and reinvention. The speaker of these poems is a sorceress, a bride, a warrior, a lover, both object and agent, ricocheting among ways of knowing and being known. Each incarnation squares itself up against ideas of feminine virtue and sin, strength and vulnerability, love and rage, as it closes in on a hard-won freedom. Brute is absolutely sure of its capacity to insist not only on the truth of what it says but on the truth of its right to say it. What am I supposed to say: Im free? the first poem asks. The rest of the poems emphatically discover new ways to answer. This is a timely winner of the Walt Whitman Award, and an introduction to an unforgettable voice.
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MegCaldwell
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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Pickpick

Unapologetic about writing poems for past selves, and lovers.

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Redwritinghood
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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This was a powerful collection of poems about the rage and heartbreak of a relationship in which she gave her love and attention to someone who didn‘t deserve it. The poems are often bleak yet fierce and display the conflicting emotions involved in loving someone who may not be the best for us. Strong, raw emotions here in this deeply engaging poetry collection. 5⭐️

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monalyisha
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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Drunkly reading poetry inside-out & upside-down in this wonderful houseboat cabin in the woods.

hgrimes I‘m a little envious! Enjoy! 5y
77 likes1 comment
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Lindy
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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A collection of fierce & haunting poems that together become a song of rage, of assessing the damage done during a romantic relationship, and of the emotional release after processing its break up. Winner of the Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets, an open competition for poets who have not yet published a book. Thanks @ReadingEnvy for bringing this outstanding book to my attention. #blameitonLitsy
(Author photo: Kaitlyn Stoddard)

Hestapleton I went to grad school with this author!! 5y
TrishB Not out here yet, stacked 👍🏻 5y
Lindy @TrishB 😁 5y
37 likes2 stack adds4 comments
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Lindy
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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In March I drop an egg hoping a bird will fly out disbelieving science. All the manuals tell me this is a logical contract. You commit yourself to a shell & you end up flying.

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Lindy
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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See how I was a bell
clanging all night

through the broken fields?
How I spoke only in code?

I know what to do
with the dark.

Cathythoughts 👍🏻♥️ 5y
Tanisha_A That's a gorgeous bell! 5y
Lindy @Tanisha_A It‘s the bell at the temple lodging where I stayed in Koyasan. 5y
45 likes3 comments
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Lindy
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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Breakfast poetry.

Cathythoughts I love cake for breakfast ♥️👍🏻 5y
Erofan Yummy! 5y
Lindy @Cathythoughts @Erofan 😊I will eat a lot of green things at lunch to compensate. 🌱 5y
45 likes1 stack add3 comments
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laumauflau
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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Pickpick

I really liked the writing style of these poems, but I am HERE for the anger.

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laumauflau
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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”WHERE CAN I PUT IT DOWN?”

What a punch in the gut.

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ReadingEnvy
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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My top reads for April are pictured.

Full tally (link at end):

Total Books Read: 35
Five-starred: 8!

Print: 15
eBook: 17
Audiobook: 3

Review copies or other galleys: 14
Library or interlibrary loan: 15
Purchased: 6

Asia 2019: 5
Womens' Prize for Fiction: 1
Poetry: 7
Leftover Tournament of Books longlist reading: 2

http://readingenvy.blogspot.com/2019/05/books-read-april-2019-83-117.html

StillLookingForCarmenSanDiego Well done! 📖💖 5y
51 likes1 comment
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ReadingEnvy
Brute: Poems | Emily Skaja
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This powerful debut collection deserves multiple readings and I've read most of them out loud as well. The end of an unhealthy relationship comes with damage and these poems reflect all of it. Some reposition the narrative to defend the person who finally got out, some are confrontational, some speak to the shared experience many women have. ⤵️

ReadingEnvy When I marked favorites to share it was practically every poem but my two top poems are probably "Brute / Brute Heart" and "No, I Do Not Want to Connect with You on LinkedIn."
5y
Kalalalatja Sounds great 👌 5y
54 likes3 stack adds2 comments