As Far As You Know
CBC Books | | Posted: March 2, 2020 2:16 PM | Last Updated: December 8, 2020
A.F. Moritz
As Far As You Know, acclaimed poet A. F. Moritz's twentieth collection of poems, begins with two sections entitled "Terrorism" and "Poetry." The book unfolds in six movements, yet it revolves around and agonizes over the struggle between these two catalyzing concepts, in all the forms they might take, eventually arguing they are the unavoidable conditions and quandary of human life.
Written and organized chronologically around before and after the poet's serious illness and heart surgery in 2014, these gorgeously unguarded poems plumb and deepen the reader's understanding of Moritz's primary and ongoing obsessions: beauty, impermanence, history, social conscience and responsibility, and, always and most urgently, love. For all its necessary engagement with worry, sorrow, and fragility, As Far As You Know sings a final insistent chorus to what it loves: "You will live." (From House of Anansi Press)
A. F. Moritz is the author of 20 poetry collections. He has won the Griffin Poetry Prize, the Bess Hokin Prize and an award in literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is currently the sixth poet laureate of the City of Toronto.
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