Ruefle, Mary: My Private Property

My Private Property by Mary Ruefle (Wave, 2017)

Publication Date: September 5, 2017

Publisher Marketing: Poetry. Author of MADNESS, RACK, AND HONEY ("One of the wisest books I've read in years," The New York Times) and TRANCES OF THE BLAST, Mary Ruefle continues to be one of the most dazzling poets in America. MY PRIVATE PROPERTY, comprised of short prose pieces, is a brilliant and charming display of her humor, deep imagination, mindfulness, and play.

"Ruefle proceeds to take us through her private understanding of every color's association with sadness, not by some order of the rainbow or color wheel, but in an order all her own. Each color section is labeled as such immediately: 'Blue sadness is sweetness cut into strips with scissors and then into little pieces by a knife.' The body is ever-present, hovering among these sadnesses: 'it is possible to dance to purple sadness, though slowly.' ...in an author's note at the end of the book: 'In each of the color pieces, if you substitute the word happiness for the word sadness, nothing changes.' The emotions are less important than the way they are embodied in objects. She reminds us that sadness and happiness are two sides of the same Möbius strip, turning endlessly into one another and back, with moments and objects merely harboring them briefly."—Stephanie Pushaw