NBCC Award Winner: "The narrative lyrics in this remarkable collection . . . could stand as compressed stories about anxiety and the body." -The New York TimesVulnerable, tender, acute, these are serious poems, brave poems, exploring with honesty the ambiguous moment between the rapture of youth and the grace of acceptance. A daughter tends to aging parents. A woman struggles with infertility-"What if, instead of carrying / a child, I am supposed to carry grief?"-and a body seized by pain and vertigo as well as ecstasy. A nation convulses: "Every song of this country / has an unsung third stanza, something brutal." And still National Book Award finalist Ada Limón shows us, as ever, the persistence of hunger, love, and joy, the dizzying fullness of our too-short lives. "Fine then, / I'll take it," she writes. "I'll take it all.""Gorgeous, thought-provoking . . . simple, striking images." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)"Exquisite." -The Washington Post"Pitch-perfect . . . full of poems to savor and share . . . She writes with remarkable directness about painful experiences normally packaged in euphemism and, in doing so, invites the readers to enter a world where abundant joy exists alongside and simultaneous to loss." -Minneapolis Star-TribuneWinner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry

Contents1.A NameAncestorsHow Most of the Dreams GoThe LeashAlmost FortyTryingOn a Pink MoonThe RaincoatThe Vulture & the BodyAmerican PharaohDandelion InsomniaDream of the RavenThe VisitorLate Summer after a Panic AttackBustDead StarsDream of DestructionPrey2.The Burying BeetleHow We Are MadeThe Light the Living SeeThe Dead BoyWhat I Want to RememberOverpassThe Millionth Dream of Your ReturnBald Eagles in a FieldI'm Sure about MagicWonder WomanThe Real ReasonThe Year of the GoldfinchesNotes on the BelowSundown and All the Damage DoneOn a Lamp Post Long AgoOf Roots & RoamersKilling MethodsFull GallopDream of the MenA New National AnthemCargoThe Contract Says: We'd Like the Conversation to Be BilingualIt's Harder3.Against BelongingInstructions on Not Giving UpWould You RatherMaybe I'll Be Another Kind of MotherCarryingWhat I Didn't Know BeforeMasteringThe Last ThingLove Poem with Apologies for My AppearanceSwaySacred ObjectsSometimes I Think My Body Leaves a Shape in the AirCannibal WomanWifeFrom the Ash Inside the BoneTime Is on FireAfter the FireLosingThe Last DropAfter His Ex DiedSparrow, What Did You Say?Notes & Acknowledgments