There are three sections of poems in this book, with each section titled after a button on a stereo, though obviously they’re also words with resonance: REPEAT, and PAUSE, and POWER. Music, both as trope and as thing, the idea of song and actual songs and musicians, figure heavily. As for the poems themselves, I like how they’re smart and conversational, I like their wryness, and I like that they’re poems that tell stories. There’s casual violence in these poems, a father beating his son with a

“If the red sun rising makes a sound, / Let my voice be that sound.” Jericho Brown's voice is a whip. A deft delivery of poetry, Please is smart, sad, beautiful, musical. I love the way in which the Tracks organize the book and music informs the poems. Song of absence. Man as song. Music as love. So many moments of inspired connection feel like keys turning. Rich full-circle gestures, fascinating lines drawn. I admire the original, organic synchronicity of the persona poems. In general, th...

What gives most pleasure in this book is its willingness to struggle with identity, and to embrace the fact that struggle consists of actions that bring him closer to understanding. Or maybe a more appropriate way to say it is that the struggle makes him more fully human.

Jericho Brown is going to be a huge, big, voice in American poetry. Some sublime lines throughout the book, and, while I normally don't go for this, the performance oriented boldness of the poems gave it all the right kind of muscle.

There are at least two poems here about Hathaway. These are woven into a sequence of poems about alcoholism, constraining religion, and the poet's father, including the one that follows "Track 8: Song for You." "Song for You" is the Donny Hathaway track, from a Leon Russell song, that many have recognized as a deeply felt excavation of same-sex preferred desire: "I know your image of me is what I hope to be" is just one of the lyrics that probes, sensitively, the worlds "of no space and time" th...

This book shared a lot of resonating themes with another book I recently read (also published in 2008): James Allen Hall's Now You're the Enemy. This made me think about the effect of braiding in a poetry collection; pulsing back to topics and images to weave a story rather than marching through it chronologically. It's a skill I need to practice. These poems are tightly wound narratives with strong images and details that do so much work. Here are some of my favorite moments from the book:"She

Absolutely excellent poetry. There's something about the rhythm and lyricism of each of the poems that just makes them come alive. You never really know where each one is headed, and it's great to read them over and over, while still being able to pick up new things. A lot of the poems are persona poems, so it's helpful to have a basic understanding of who the speaker is each piece (there's a short reference guide in the back to help with this). As it says on the back of the book, the work is ma...

Dear God, Please will hurt you - in a good way. It's a very physical and lyrical book of poetry that just goes right through you with one seamless poem followed by another. Think of an extended metaphor, music as the medium, in which we are allowed to experience the speaker's pain in bass; joy, with its fierce undying love, ("Sean"; "Betty Jo Jackson"; "Like Father") sung in soprano until you are spent; and, throw in nothing less than a beautiful voice laced with male eroticism, its bluesy, smok...

I love this book because Jericho put some much love into it. Drawing from his personal experiences as well as his love of R&B, he's created quite a collection.

Read this while vacationing at Hammonasset Beach this weekend. Really liked some of the poems, but had a hard time relating to most of them.

Jericho Brown promises no revelations. His poems are tight, trimmed of excess, lyrical and lonely.I want to answer their questionsTell them the dead man’s nameBut I cannot identify the broken body.Even I don’t know who he is.His poems are home to the hardest questions: Can a boy love the father who whips him? What’s the best way to injure, after departure, the person one loves?How best to hurt you. Fling a pitcher of sweet tea.Leave All the lights on.Phone your mother And threaten cremation.Set

I’ll never forget the first time I read “Host” in Poetry Foundation. Jericho Brown became my favorite poet from this century. The way he chains his verses, keeps you reading and finding new meaning over and over again, making his work a wonderful—yet terribly sad—garden of roses that keeps revealing new shapes every time you approach it. “Please” compiles another set of poems and songs that continue to display this mastery of language, while addressing topics such as family and homosexuality. An...

This poetry collection overwhelmed me. I can sense that there is something in there. Something. In there. I am confused. So instead of trying to give you a sense of what Jericho's poems are about, I will let the text on the back cover speak for itself:Please explores the points in our lives at which love and violence intersect. Drunk on its own rhythms and full of imaginative and often frightening imagery, Please is the album playing in the background of the history and culture that surround Afr...

The Burning BushLizard’s shade turned torch, what thorns I bore Nomadic shepherds clipped. Still, I’ve stood, a soldier listening for the word, Attack, a prophet praying any ember be spokenThrough me in this desert full of fugitives.Now, I have a voice. Entered, I am lit. Remember me for this sprouting fire,For the lash of flaming tongues that lick But do not swallow my leaves, my flimsy Branches. No ash behind, I burn to bloom. I am not consumed. I am not consumed.

a lot to like, a brave book

I have worked my way backwards through Jericho Brown's astonishing books of poems, arriving at last to his first collection, 2008's "Please." I have no doubt that he is one of the greatest living poets writing in the English language, and we are so fortunate to have his voice.

"God's got his eye on me, but I ain't a sparrow. / I'm more like a lawn mower... no, a chainsaw" (19).Jericho Brown will be at one of the virtual events for St Andrews' annual poetry festival (StAnza) in two weeks, and I'm so excited! He has such a commanding poetic presence and grasp of biblical nuance. And Ilya Kaminsky will be at an event too, so I'm in heaven!

Jericho Brown is a kickass storyteller, which is why I love his poems and this book so much. Look at this short poem "Lunch", which I'll include here without line breaks:In a fast-food line, one man pulls a penny from another man's hand, grins too wide a grin, and pays the extra change. The boy standing behind the register takes my jealous stare for one of disapproval and shakes his head at me to say, I hate faggots too. Carefully shifting my weight onto one skinny leg, I open my appropriate mou...

Jericho Brown’s poetry collection Please is organized into four sections: Repeat, Pause, Power and Stop. Brown continues the musical theme throughout a cycle of poems whose titles are all numbered tracks and whose content references song lyrics. Other poems refer to characters from The Wizard of Oz and slide fluidly between elevated verse and rhythmic slang. These devices serve as entry points for Brown’s intimate explorations of love, violence, and the lines where they intersect. Sometimes thos...