Donkey Gospel: Poems - Softcover

"A self-proclaimed postmodern confessionalist poet, Hoagland's poems gather and distribute so much energy it's like he's a boxer -- or a wrestler -- rather than a writer."--T Magazine, "My 10 Favorite Books: James Franco" "An absolutely refreshing compound of playfulness and depth . . . There's no warmed-over theory on this menu, and no guilt casserole, either: [Donkey Gospel is] an unabashedly spicy book. But if one is seduced into the book by the wildness of its flavors, one finishes by loving its substance."--Heather McHugh "There's an underlying sweetness to the poems, and a gratitude for having survived so much human fecklessness (including, of course, one's own), and these complicate the poems' anger and puzzlement and rumple their severe surfaces. The resulting mixture has much of the complexity of a personality that willingly weathers its own perplexities and experiences, rather than striking a pose of competence and trying to ride out the storm."--William Matthews "If the current flush of identity politics has you bored beyond belief, you might look for a deeper and truer sense of identity and belief in Donkey Gospel. It's a powerful second book, and leaves one wanting more."--Harvard Review "In Donkey Gospel, Hoagland's puzzlement is palpable, and yet his effervescent cleverness and original twists of phrase, sometimes aphoristic in philosophical content, ring true. His poetry of cultural irony, contemporary sexuality, and the absurdities of the rock-and-roll generation leave us with a satisfied feeling of having ridden out a storm." --Ruminator Review "[A] series of autobiographical poems about being a guy, from backslapping tales of sexual exploits to the dark and dirty truths of male animalism . . . Apologetic for being cerebral, Hoagland pays homage to Auden and D. H. Lawrence in poems that recognize one's powerful vocabulary and the other's ability to fight, and fuck, and crow in prose." --Kirkus Reviews

Tony Hoagland's effervescence and a jujitsu cleverness sparkle through poems about negotiation and compromise, gender and culture, sex and rock and roll. From the boy who speaks only in "Kung Fu" dialogue to a man visiting a lesbian bar, Hoagland gives a sense of finally being able to tell the truth about the credentials for contemporary manhood.