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Andrew Collard's lyrical poems about Detroit show how the social and geographical past influences the present. Written from the perspective of a single parent raising a child amid increasing social isolation, economic insecurity, public catastrophes, and anxiety, Sprawl reminds us of the comforting endurance of communal experience.
List of contents
Diorama 1
Future RuinsPerpetual Motion 5
Quizzo Night at The Red Ox 7
Cicada Song 10
Pax Americana 11
Autotopia 13
Future Ruins 14
Wartime, Rally’s Drive-In 17
Carried 19
Clippings: Sterling Assembly Plant 23
Where the Birds WentCrawling Backwards 27
The Nest 28
Unpunctuated Days 29
Elegy for the Dymaxion Car 31
Autotopia 34
They Say King’s Forest Boulevard Is Healing 35
Sub-pastoral 37
After News of a Border Shutdown, I Venture Out for Fries 39
Clippings: Sterling Assembly Plant 43
SprawlGas & Food 47
Key Motor Mall 49
On the Demolition of Produce Kingdom 51
Telway Lament 53
Autotopia 56
Badlands Flashback 57
Night Music 59
Commute 61
Clippings: Sterling Assembly Plant 65
How to Be HeldChurch can be a word for anywhere 69
Landscape with Ryegrass and Hunger 71
Idyll 73
City of Windows 74
Night Cycle 77
Autotopia 78
To My Son Henry, Asleep in the Next Room 80
Dear leasing office, dear oil slick 82
Acknowledgments 85
Notes and Dedications 87
About the author
Andrew Collard's poems have appeared in
Ploughshares, AGNI, Virginia Quarterly Review, Best New Poets, and elsewhere. He currently lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan, with his son and their cats.
Summary
Andrew Collard’s lyrical poems about Detroit show how the social and geographical past influences the present. Written from the perspective of a single parent raising a child amid increasing social isolation, economic insecurity, public catastrophes, and anxiety, Sprawl reminds us of the comforting endurance of communal experience.
