Disheveled Histories

The third book of poetry by Reno, Nevada, based poet, Michelle Murphy. Pulitzer Prize winner Diane Seuss sings the praises of Murphy's new book: "The poems in Michelle Murphy's Disheveled Histories both echo the dishevelment and bring order to family history, personal history, the natural history of the body, and the land on which it resides, where "[t]hese rapids spit out / trailer hitch, tangled lures, / dime-size locket, crumbled jacket," and where "even a butterfly / can anger God." Murphy uncovers a sort of defiant eternity in her poems, though not the easy kind. Regarding a brother, who takes his own life by leaping from the Golden Gate bridge, she writes: "Even your father, his / history, moth-holed / almost laughs when / your urn refuses / to sink under the waves. / Nothing ends." Michelle Murphy has written a beautiful, gutsy, and restorative collection."