The Only Afterlife

Recognition

“Taking as their subject the ‘bitter wisdoms’ learned in a childhood marked by war, exile, and family strife, Mariève Rugo’s poems reveal the courage of survival and memory. In her new volume, The Only Afterlife, we see how Rugo’s nuanced language is attentive to unexpected beauties–a skein of Canada geese ‘unwinding through sapphire air,’ her mother swimming naked in a ‘flat turquoise bay . . . bronze fish spattering diamonds,’ ‘the grammar of buds’ in springtime. Giving voice to ‘the unspeakable’ burdens of knowledge, Rugo explores the ‘invisible boundaries’ of love and despair, wisdom and illusion. These are poems of a life lived fully in the candid awareness of how loss opens a space for gratitude.”–Susan Snively