Boomerangs in the Living Room

(Paperback)

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Rex Wilder's second collection introduces the world to a new form: the boomerang, a four-line nouveau haiku, an anti-Tweet that aims for permanence in an evanescent world. These \u201cadmirable throwaways\u201d (so nicknamed by Richard Wilbur, who advised the author on their shape) must rhyme the first word or syllable with the last. The opening salvo must suggest a coda, the bullet must return to its chamber. In the process, the poem moves like a boomerang: according to Wilbur, \u201ca thrown boomerang has three phases: it flies to first base (as it were), then travels over to third and rises, then swoops home.\u201d Boomerangs in the Living Room catches in its sweep literature's classic themes: love, death, family, sex. The poems that come swooping back are seductive, destructive, endlessly quotable, and heartbreakingly beautiful.

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Featured in Vroman's Bookstore Virtual Event Poem featured on National Review

Author Bio

Rex Wilder's poems have appeared in publications such as Poetry, The New Republic, Yale Review, and TheTimes Literary Supplement. He is the author of Waking Bodies, which takes "the tired English of everyday use" and brings it "back to us refreshed and full of its original surprise," according to Billy Collins. Wilder is editing an anthology called There and Back, featuring original boomerangs from a diverse range of poets around the world. He is the Chief Creative Strategist for Advertising for Humanity, a marketing firm specializing in charities and community foundations. He lives in Brentwood, California.