Here Come the Moonbathers

While the tone of Patricia Young’s latest collection, Here Come the Moonbathers, is perhaps more dark, difficult and tragic than her earlier work, beautifully hedonic poems spark and sizzle throughout. The poems in this collection have wild freedom, different kinds of power, exploring the themes of love and longing and loss (especially the latter) with grace, bewilderment, playfulness, and occasionally anger. There’s a surreal edge to many of these poems, a personal, political and ecological vision, and an incantatory vernacular and rhythm that makes these poems unforgettable. This collection is perhaps the more important and immediately human of Patricia Young’s celebrated career.

AUTHOR

Patricia Young

Patricia Young has published eleven books of poetry, most recently, Night-Eater, which was shortlisted for the Dorothy Livesay Award in 2010. She has received numerous awards for her poetry including the CBC Literary Prize, the Pat Lowther Award, The Dorothy Livesay Award, the Bliss Carmen Award, two National Magazine Awards, Arc’s Poem of the Year Award and the Confederation Poet’s Prize. Two of her collections have been shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award. Her collection of short fiction, Airstream, won the Rooke-Metcalf Prize and was named one of the Globe and Mail’s best books of the year. She lives in Victoria, B. C.