Containing more than a hundred poems by seventy-four poets of twenty-two nationalities, Say This of Horses represents the abundance of poems about horses that have been written throughout the ages and around the world. Whether probing the ages-old connection between horses and humans, the immediate physical presence of horses, or the metaphysical elements of these magnificent animals, this collection celebrates the horse as what Maxine Kumin calls 鈥渙ur enduring myth, the repository for our love and terror.鈥
Divided into six sections, Say This of Horses considers horses in a multitude of times and places. 鈥淎ntiquity鈥 explores the forging of the earliest mythical ties between horses and humans. 鈥淗ere, Now鈥 places horses in the present, where their physical presence is most acutely felt. 鈥淓ssence鈥 explores the metaphysical qualities of horses. 鈥淗arnessed鈥 contains a selection of poems about horses in war, at work, and in sport and recreation. 鈥淢irrors鈥 shows them as imaginative symbols. Finally, 鈥淟enses鈥 moves into the realm of abstraction and fantasy.
The selections within this far-reaching collection are joyous, moving, erudite, and at times profoundly sad. Poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, W. S. Merwin, Tess Gallagher, Yusef Komunyakaa, Pablo Neruda, Anne Sexton, Wallace Stevens, May Sarton, Jane Kenyon, and James Dickey, among many others, are sure to delight and surprise readers familiar with or just exploring the rich literature on horses.
Contributors include Guillaume Apollinaire, Gwendolyn Brooks, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Donald Hall, Joy Harjo, Imru鈥 al-Qays, Ted Kooser, Philip Larkin, Pablo Neruda, Rainer Maria Rilke, Pattiann Rogers, Carl Sandburg and William Carlos Williams.
鈥淭he physicality of horses and our attachments to them bring out the best in many of these poets, who describe them so tenderly their rippling flesh seems to come alive under our hands. This book is a solid, well-designed, and sometimes daring poetic representation of the history of and human response to horses.鈥濃擠orianne Laux, author, Facts about the Moon
鈥淗orses鈥 names remembered at a burial pasture; a stud pining for the mare whose kick fractured his cannon bone, a vicious but loved mare sent to auction, a vet鈥檚-eye view of hard foaling, anticipations of dog food鈥攖his fine collection explores the heartache of horses along with their grace and their grandeur.鈥濃擫inda Woodbridge, Weiss Professor of English and the Humanities, Pennsylvania State University
