The Grey Tote

The Grey Tote, Deena Kara Shaffer’s debut, is a collection of elegies on the death, in quick succession, of her father and mother. Scorning easy consolations, Shaffer’s poems are witty, epigrammatic, rhythmic, spiked with grief but ultimately dry-eyed “lessons in goodbye,” she calls them, “Sentences / cut.” In coming to grips with what to do “now that now/ has no them in it,” she has arrived at a book of poetry fiercer and truer than most written today.

Reviews

Advance Praise for The Grey Tote:

“The Grey Tote is impressive for its attitude and language–its direct expression of fear, its realization of mortality in the technological labyrinth. The style is direct, spare, hard, clear, but with elegance and significant whimsy.” –A.F. Moritz