Kab­bal­is­tic poems that rec­og­nize wit as a rit­u­al of mourn­ing, win­ner of the 2020 Lexi Rud­nit­sky First Book Prize

The poems in Town Crier wry­ly express the per­va­sive nature of loss, how it suf­fus­es all aspects of a life: mem­o­ries, hopes, love, sex, lunch. The death of the author’s dear friend, the late poet Max Rit­vo, becomes the cor­ner­stone of the book, a foun­da­tion­al pain along which the poems are aligned. The poems grieve. They try to cope. They come up short. They try again, insist­ing as they do that lan­guage holds con­se­quen­tial, redemp­tive pow­ers. Sarah Matthes is equal parts jester and con­jur­er, sens­ing the pre­cious alche­my of laugh­ter and lament, cry­ing out to those who have left her and those who remain.