Life on Earth: Poems

In her seventh collection, Dorianne Laux once again offers poems that move us, include us, and appreciate us fully as the flawed humans we are. is a book of praise for our planet and ourselves, delivered with Laux’s trademark vitality, frank observation, and earthy wisdom. With odes to the unlikely and elemental—salt, snow, crows, cups, Bisquick, a shovel and rake, the ubiquitous can of WD-40, “the way / it releases the caught cogs / of the world”— urges us all to find extraordinary magic in the mess of ordinary life. “One of our most daring contemporary poets” (Diana Whitney, ), Laux balances wonder at the night sky and the taste of a ripe peach with recognition of the sharp knife of mortality. The volume includes powerful homages to the poet’s mother and her carpenter’s spirit, reflections on loss and aging, and encounters with the fleeting beauty of the natural world. Transcending life’s inevitable moments of pain and uncertainty, instructs us in our own endless possibilities and the astonishing riches of the world around us.