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Contents:
- ROSS GAY’S UNFOLDG UNRSTANDG OF UNABASHED GRATU
- ROSS GAY
- HOW ROSS GAY FDS JOY IN THE SMALLT OF 'DELIGHTS'
- ROSS GAY
ROSS GAY’S UNFOLDG UNRSTANDG OF UNABASHED GRATU
On the Co Swch podst, Ross Gay reflects on his 2019 llectn The Book of Delights, the difficulty of allowg yourself to be moved, and why he thks 's important to e the word "love." * ross gay gratitude *
A formidable ntemporary poet, Ross Gay earned his BA om Lafayette College, received his MFA poetry at Sarah Lawrence, and was granted a PhD Amerin lerature om Temple Universy. Gay is a foundg edor of the onle sports magaze Some Call It Ball’ and an active edor of the chapbook prs Q Avenue and Ledge Mule Prs. Asi om teachg at Indiana Universy Bloomgton, Gay also acts as a board member for the Bloomgton Communy Orchard, a non-prof ee-u-for-all food jtice and joy project.
As the thor of three poetry llectns, Agast Which (2006), Brgg the Shovel Down (2011), and Catalog of Unabashed Gratu (2015), Ross Gay has already garnered a remarkable rerd of achievements and regnn. Gay received grants om the Pennsylvania Council of the Arts and fellowships om both the Guggenheim Foundatn and the Radcliffe Instute and is a former Cave Canem Workshop fellow and Bread Loaf Wrer’s Conference scholar.
In certa moments, Gay’s poems act as knowg s and slow, solemn nods; at others, his vers are stead wry wks. Gay bls the quotidian wh a tone of mature joyfulns, elevatg the ordary to the realm of the sublime wh his ft poetic treatment. But Ross Gay did not achieve this nveyed sense of unabashed gratu that embrac both the pleasur and hardships of existence overnight.
ROSS GAY
79 quot om Ross Gay: 'Bee tryg to articulate what, perhaps, joy is, has occurred to me that among other thgs—the tre and the mhrooms have shown me this—joy is the mostly visible, the unrground unn between , you and me, which is, among other thgs, the great fact of our life and the liv of everyone and thg we love gog away. If we sk a spoon to that fact, to the duff between , we will fd teemg. It will look like all the books ever wrten. It will look like all the nerv a body. We might ll sorrow, but we might ll a unn, one that, once we notice , once we brg to the light, might bee flower and food. Might be joy.', 'I suppose I uld spend time theorizg how is that people are not bad to each other, but that’s really not the pot. The pot is that almost every stance of our liv, our social liv, we are, if we pay attentn, the midst of an almost nstant, if subtle, retakg. Holdg open doors. Offerg elbows at crosswalks. Lettg someone else go first. Helpg wh the heavy bags. Reachg what’s too high, or what’s been dropped. Pullg someone back to their feet. Stoppg at the r wreck, at the stck dog. The alternatg merge, also known as the zipper. This retakg is our flt mo and ’s always a lie that nvc to act or believe otherwise. Always.', and 'It didn’t take me long to learn that the disciple or practice of wrg the says ocsned a kd of light radar. Or maybe was more like the velopment of a light mcle. Somethg that impli that the more you study light, the more light there is to study.' * ross gay gratitude *
Gay sists that like this newborn, our own railgs agast the horrors herent existence make both “impossible, / goln” and “longg, gone” (8). And “Thank You, ” Gay urg his rears that spe the fact that “all you love will turn to dt…do not raise your fist.
Here Gay remends gratu spe of life’s stggl, whereas his later vers ll for an appreciatn of both the lighter and darker aspects of realy. In Ross Gay’s send llectn of poetry, Brgg the Shovel Down, the poetic distance between life’s granur and stctn has dramatilly creased.
HOW ROSS GAY FDS JOY IN THE SMALLT OF 'DELIGHTS'
Catalog of Unabashed Gratu is a poetry llectn by Indiana poet Ross Gay that celebrat life and goodns and that which nourish , fleetgly and forever, through love and loss, om everyday livg and garng and noticg what we often take for granted. * ross gay gratitude *
Intertgly, the tular poem and s echo, Gay prents a ghastly childhood episo and s revised, rtorative versn to pict the alternate sis of existence’s . What mak Ross Gay’s eponymo poem om Catalog of Unabashed Gratu all the more stunng is s -mglg of appreciatn for life’s joys and sorrows.
ROSS GAY
Ross Gay was born Youngstown, Oh. He earned a BA om Lafayette College, an MFA Poetry om Sarah Lawrence College, and a PhD English om… * ross gay gratitude *
Through the eye of Gay’s matured poetic lens, even the pa of realy be important.
Alongsi l praisg the bety of robs and orchards, the buzz of be and the bsh of blooms, Gay also thanks the universe “for not takg my pal when the enge / of his md dragged him / to swig fistfuls of Xanax…[and] for takg my father a few years after his father went down” (84). The work reflects Gay’s steadfast refal to ignore realy’s agoni and his stubborn choice to privilege the thm of life s entirety.