# Bestiary - Paperback

by **Elise Paschen** (Author)

"The poems in Elise Paschen's _Bestiary_ explore domestic preoccupations set against the backdrop of the wild-heartedness, real and imagined, of the animal world," praises the poet Jason Shinder. In this modern-day _Bestiary_, or "Book of Beasts," the line between animal and human is thinly-drawn - the daughter of a Celtic king, through love, is transformed from beast to human; lovers take flight as moon and owl; manatees transform, before the explorers' eyes, into mermaids. This dynamic runs throughout the collection: taking flight, hovering between air and earth, plunging, and then resurfacing from water. The poems create a constant engagement between what tethers us to our daily lives - marriage, motherhood, raising a family, the loss of parents in old age - and the desire for other worlds. Exploring notions of transformation, these poems cross thresholds between animal and human, between death and life.

  

Award-winning poet, Elise Paschen, creates in her third and most complex poetry collection, work which is elegant and passionate, preternaturally still and reckless all at once. Paschen displays a variety of form and nuance - from ghazals to long-lined free verse poems. Writing out of a distinct Western literary tradition, but tapping into her Native American (Osage) roots, Paschen celebrates the mythic, the unusual, the magical glimpsed in the everyday.

### Author Biography

Elise Paschen is the author of three poetry collections: _Infidelities_ (Story Line), winner of the Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize, _Houses: Coasts_ (Sycamore Press, Oxford), and, most recently, _Bestiary_ (Red Hen Press). She is editor of _Poetry Speaks to Children_ and co-editor of _Poetry Speaks Expanded_ (Sourcebooks) and _Poetry in Motion_ (Norton).Paschen teaches in the Writing Program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

**Number of Pages:** 80

**Dimensions:** 0.1 x 8.7 x 5.8 IN

**Publication Date:** April 01, 2009

## Details

- **Price:** 16.95 USD
- **Vendor:** Books by splitShops
- **Type:** Books
- **Tags:** Books by splitShops, Shopify Collective

## Variants

| Variant | Price | Available |
|---------|-------|-----------|
| Default Title | 16.95 USD | In stock |

## Images

- Bestiary - Paperback

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