Dog Language by Chase Twichell (Author)

ISBN: 9781556592317

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Copper Canyon Press, September 1, 2005

Paperback, 96 pages

Over the past 25 years, Twichell’s reputation and reach has broadened with each new book. She is a poet whose books are anticipated and consistently receive stellar national review attention:

“A major voice in contemporary poetry.”—Publishers Weekly

“A poet with a dazzling and profound imagination.”—Library Journal

“An extraordinary poet whose lyrics plumb great intellectual and emotional depths.”—The Miami Herald

“There is a . . . Zen-like lucidity to [Twichell’s] poetry.”—The Washington Post

Dog Language addresses the Zen question “What is the self?” in the modern age, where individual identity is questioned, medicated, and revised. Chase Twichell’s tightly drawn poems move through the stages of human development and capture the complex emotions and challenges of family and aging.

Like the best of artists, Twichell is able to handle common themes and emotions without ever reducing them to cliché or sentiment. She reminds us of “The Rules” she uses in her poems: “Tell the truth. No decoration. Remember death.” In one of the most poignant sections of Dog Language, she writes of her father’s death and asks what, if anything, survives us: