Backup Singers by Sommer Browning (Birds LLC, paperback)
Publication Date: June 3, 2014
Publisher Marketing: Poetry. Browning follows up her sold out debut, EITHER WAY I'M CELEBRATING, with an even rawer and starker, and again darkly humorous navigation of friendship, marriage, and motherhood. The result is a more overtly political assessment of the absurd deficit between what we're confronted with and what we're equipped with to deal with those confrontations: "It's a girl, / and the wires she needs // open her hands / before they're fists." Browning combats this deficit with relentless anaphora and repetition, reducing seemingly impossible relationships to their most basic element—a love that begets an unconditional loyalty: "I'm here! I didn't run!"
