Hothead is a haibun-patterned, book-length declamation in which no topic is off limits—Buddha, Jesus, Lincoln, America, global warming, eros, mental illness, the natural world, technology, the aging body. Cushman’s poetry shows us how to live in a world in which it is difficult to balance “the place where light and dark meet.” With an outmoded laptop named Patience as his daily consort, the speaker navigates through themes of love, politics, and belief. “There’s got to be someone, ” Cushman writes, “exploring the way, ” and the speaker of
Hothead steps in to fill those shoes with intelligence, endurance, moxie, and humility.
About the author
A native New Englander, Stephen Cushman has written several volumes of poetry, two books of literary criticism, and two studies of the Civil War. He is also the general editor of the fourth edition of the
Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics. He is Robert C. Taylor Professor of English at the University of Virginia and lives in Charlottesville.