Terrible Blooms

"Ms. Stein reminds us that there is no honey—rough, or otherwise—without the sting." —The New York Times In this lush, disturbing second collection from Melissa Stein, exquisite images are salvaged from harm and survival. Set against the natural world's violence—both ordinary and sublime—pain shines jewel-like out of these poems, illuminating what lovers and families conceal. Stein uses her gifts for persona and lyric richness to build worlds that are vivid, intricate, tough, sexy, and raw: "over and over // life slapping you in the face / till you're newly burnished / flat-out gasping and awake." Breathless with risk and redemption, Terrible blooms shows how loss claims us and what we reclaim. "[Melissa Stein's] sentences are beautifully choreographed; they start and stop the motion of her poems with a nearly invisible, effortless authority." —Mark Doty"[Stein's] electric apprehensions throb with this nearly preverbal...