Chris Hosea

Chris Hosea Poems

Chris Hosea Biography

Chris Hosea (born November 11, 1973, Princeton, New Jersey) is an American poet. Hosea earned his BA in English from Harvard University. He earned his MFA in Poetry from the University of Massachusetts Amherst's MFA Program for Poets & Writers. Pulitzer Prize-winning poet John Ashbery selected Hosea's first poetry collection, Put Your Hands In, for the Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets. Ashbery, in his judge's citation for the Walt Whitman Award, wrote that Hosea's poetry "somehow subsumes derision and erotic energy and comes out on top." Reviewers of Put Your Hands In have highlighted the book's emphasis on contradiction, the absurd, and sound, comparing it to poetry by Language poets. Critic Stu Watson described Hosea's poetry as "not a confession but a revelation," calling it the product of "an impossibly refined imaginative vision, a vision that, remarkably open to interpretation, manages to reveal almost nothing about its creator, the poet beyond the page, while disclosing volumes about the contemporary reality in which that poet lives." Cristina M Rau critiqued the book's "distracting...references to hyper-contemporary technology that simply does not seem to fit: iPhones, Facebook, Uggs, Instagram," but added that "The pieces confuse and delight and reveal in a mostly successful way." Publishers Weekly found that Put Your Hands In "juggles sexualized imagery, contemporary and historical pop cultural references, and an inventive approach to language that is as relentlessly provocative as it is approachable." Library Journal described Hosea's poetry as an "energized, tumbling mass of tight-stitched imagery" that "presents a sort of nutty roadshow of American culture." Hosea's second book of poems, Double Zero, was published in 2016 by Prelude. Poet Ben Fama called the collection "by turns melancholy, fragmented, and true to feeling....a book-length artist statement via linguistic selfies," and claimed that Double Zero "accurately maps the experience of the contemporary subject." Hosea is curator of the Brooklyn-based Blue Letter Reading Series, which was named "Best Reading Series (Poetry)" in New York City by The L Magazine. Hosea is the recipient of fellowship residencies from Vermont Studio Center and Writers Omi Ledig House. Hosea's visual and conceptual artwork is represented by Brooklyn gallery Transmitter)

The Best Poem Of Chris Hosea

New Make

what comes next is
possible to theorize one
period emerging now
explore late ailments
see shells or pounds of ruler
also a lecture at Choate
spurred her ken for new
nests that break ice
got the germ of moribund style
what is it that Joe wants
to free poetry from
deliberate space of wail
conveys a need for hugs
one more future among none
not quite forgotten now
easy to get heated at a lectern
after drinking television looks
better be stumping for ease
that offspring will steal
like lovely stickers peeled
from white shapes that held
tells you she was born built
as much as born to slip
into a car driven by a diver
you and she do not yet
perceive as form critique allows
for just some laughter not waste
pretense unforgiven hidden patience
every tentative second awaiting buses
means you are wanted
like a wanted man is wanted
eyes deliberate blur past posters would I
lick off your lipstick and rouge

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