Country Music: Selected Early Poems

By Charles Wright and David St. John

A compilation of powerful and moving poems from early in the poet’s career.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wesleyan
• Release date: Mar 1, 2011
• ISBN: 9780819572264

Charles Wright

Charles Wright is the United States Poet Laureate. His poetry collections include Country Music, Black Zodiac, Chickamauga, Bye-and-Bye: Selected Later Poems, Sestets, and Caribou. He is a winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the National Book Award, the Griffin Poetry Prize, and the 2013 Bollingen Prize for American Poetry. Born in Pickwick Dam, Tennessee in 1935, he currently lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Reviews for Country Music

[dasam-5 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A first-rate collection by Charles Wright. Wright's poetry is spiritual without being self-righteous or self-indulgent.

"When he lies down, the waters will lie down with him,
And all that walks and all that stands still, and sleep through the thunder."

He is true to nature's imagery but also is comfortable signifying through and by that imagery.

"Don’t wait for the snowfall from the dogwood tree.
Live like a huge rock covered with moss,
Rooted half under the earth and anxious for no one."

He is not afraid of simplicity or of eloquence:

"Home is what you lie in, or hang above, the house
Your father made, or keeps on making,
The dirt you moisten, the sap you push up and nourish"

I enjoyed living some of my days reading this collection.