I didn’t want to believeWhat we believe in those rooms:That we are blessed, letting go,Letting someone, anyone,Drag open the drapes and heave usBack into our blinding, bright lives.Review to follow.

Not wall-to-wall winners, but a damned interesting mix of styles and moods and words, all built around the theme of space and a departed dad (her father worked on the Hubble telescope). Pulitzer prize-winning poetry. Triple P. And I shared multiple poems from the text on my blah, blah, blog starting down this here rabbit hole and moving forward two or three posts, chronologically.

Wow. That was a beautiful collection. My favorites:- The Universe is a House Party- Museum of Obsolescence- Aubade- US & CO.

I listened (read by the author) to this book, and there were some beautiful poems in this volume. I think I will need to read these, though, to get a better appreciation for the author's word choices and emotions.

US & CO.We are here for what amounts to a few hours, a day at most.We feel around making sense of the terrain, our own new limbs,Bumping up against a herd of bodies until one becomes home.Moments sweep past. The grass bends then learns again to stand.

"Everything that disappears/Disappears as if returning somewhere." (from the poem "The Universe: The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack")Riveting and heartfelt poems involving relationships, space, David Bowie, dark matter, and the afterlife. This book has been on my to-read list for a few years now, and I am grateful that I finally got around to it.Favorites:"The Weather in Space""Cathedral Kitsch""The Largeness We Can't See""The Soul"

For 2017 I have set a goal for myself to read a minimum of twenty Pulitzer winners across all platforms. Upon hearing that Tracy K Smith had been named the United States poet laureate for the next year, I decided to read her 2012 Pulitzer winning collection Life on Mars. In poetry that is a mix of free verse, prose, letters, and songs, Smith delivers powerful words in a four part opus. Three poems stood out in this collection. The first, The Speed of Belief, pays homage to Smith's late father. W...

"When the stormKicks up and nothing is ours, we go chasingAfter all we're certain to lose, so alive ---Faces radiant with panic.” Tracy K. Smith’s Life on Mars is a fantastic collection of poems that explores a wide variety of issues: grief, illness, pop culture, the weather and David Bowie. What drew me in further was how Smith linked her poems through space and science fiction imagery to question who we are and what we are doing at this moment. Sometimes, I felt like I was exploring the depth...

I wanted to love this wholeheartedly, but it straddled the line between "Oh, that's pretty!" and "What did I just read?" I forgot to mark this on Goodreads so it's been about a week since I've read it, and I honestly couldn't even give you a synopsis of what these poems were about because I think their message was a little lost on me, but I did mark several lines and poems I enjoyed, so I'm glad I picked it up.

Divided into four short sections, Life on Mars roams amongst a vast range of subjects: the cultural impact of David Bowie, the serenity of late spring mornings, the death of Smith's own father, the horror of racialized killings. Smith's interest in narrative and in pop culture links the disparate poems together, though, as does her crystalline imagery. Favorite poems included "The Speed of Belief" and "Don't You Wonder, Sometimes?"

Interesting concept -- poetry about or inspired by science fiction. Overall I found the ideas more impressive than the aesthetic qualities of the poems themselves. In those last scenes of Kubrick’s 2001When Dave is whisked into the center of space,Which unfurls in an aurora of orgasmic lightBefore opening wide, like a jungle orchidFor a love-struck bee, then goes liquid,Paint-in-water, and then gauze wafting out and off,Before, finally, the night tide, luminescentAnd vague, swirls in, and on a...

A group of poems, many overtly political, that stand on their own as poetry as well (for the most part). One particularly moving section has people who have been killed writing letters from the beyond to their murderers.

An outstanding book of poetry. There's a real narrative quality to many of the poems and I particularly appreciated the breadth of topics Smith engages with in her poetry. Some of the strongest poems are those that deal with current events. There's a strong sense of accessibility in that...these are the kind of poems that are meant to be read and understood and appreciated. Some moments are simply breathtaking. She uses the word gracile, which is a lovely, lovely word. The whole collection is mi...

This was great. My favorite was the one about Bowie ("Don't You Wonder, Sometimes?"), but I loved the set of poems about her father, and the way she kept using outer-space imagery and themes. When she was named Poet Laureate, I immediately took this out of the library and inhaled it, but I can see myself getting my own copy and rereading it someday.

I was really torn about whether to give this three or four stars. The poems I liked I REALLY REALLY liked and these included Savior Machine, My God It's Full of Stars, Life on Mars (the title poem) and They May Love All That He Has Chosen and Hate All He Has Rejected. But other times I would be reading one of the poems in this collection and it was almost like my eyes would slide right off of it, like there was an obliqueness there that I couldn't get through. Nothing to hang onto in some poems....

I had a really hard time with this collection. I really wanted to like it. And if it hadn't received a Pulitzer, I would not have judged it so harshly, but, because I expect quality and a respect for the macrocosm of poetry from Pulitzer-prize-winning poetry and poets, I approached this collection with high expectations. I was deeply disappointed. Tracy Smith does have a certain innocence and wonder for life that is touching, and she asks probing questions, but her observations are too generaliz...

"Sailors fighting in the dance hallOh man! Look at those cavemen goIt's the freakiest showTake a look at the LawmanBeating up the wrong guyOh man! Wonder if he'll ever knowHe's in the best selling showIs there life on Mars?" -Life on Mars, David Bowie. I choose that song over any of these poems any day, but that does not detract from my enjoyment of the poems presented in this collection. The future isn't what it used to be. Even Bowie thirstsFor something good and cold. Jets blink across the

Tracy Smith has written a volume of poetry touching on a favorite theme of mine, life on earth which requires one to stand and let imagination vault into the meaningless distances of outer space. Her book is ultimately about love, I think, concerned as it is with her father who famously worked as an engineer on the Hubble Telescope project. Her poetry here connects the closeness of earth with the reaches of space her father made it possible to see. In that way Smith can be thought of as life on

3/5The cover is gorgeous but this collection didn't work for me.

Will have to come back to this one. I know it's been highly lauded, but . . . It didn't do it for me. Though there were a few poems I really liked. Could be me. I should come back with a more open mind.