Occupations

The poems in Chris Jennings's long-awaited debut poetry collection are linked at their core by a preoccupation with the ways objects or moments become charged with meaning. Narrative occupies the territory of memory, making the most ordinary things--a classified ad, the odds and ends of an estate auction, graffiti, an antique lancet, a vegetable stand--touchstones and reliquaries of other lives. Sometimes reserved, sometimes exploring what a poet can do with excess, Jennings moves fluidly between objective detachment, quiet intimacy and the tone of a cynic in a sentimental mood.