Nature Poem

Fiction & Literature, Poetry
Cover of the book Nature Poem by Tommy Pico, Tin House Books
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Tommy Pico ISBN: 9781941040645
Publisher: Tin House Books Publication: May 9, 2017
Imprint: Tin House Books Language: English
Author: Tommy Pico
ISBN: 9781941040645
Publisher: Tin House Books
Publication: May 9, 2017
Imprint: Tin House Books
Language: English

**A book-length poem about how an American Indian writer can’t bring himself to write about nature, but is forced to reckon with colonial-white stereotypes, manifest destiny, and his own identity as an young, queer, urban-dwelling poet.

A Best Book of the Year at BuzzFeed, Interview, and more.**

** **

Nature Poem follows Teebs—a young, queer, American Indian (or NDN) poet—who can’t bring himself to write a nature poem. For the reservation-born, urban-dwelling hipster, the exercise feels stereotypical, reductive, and boring. He hates nature. He prefers city lights to the night sky. He’d slap a tree across the face. He’d rather write a mountain of hashtag punchlines about death and give head in a pizza-parlor bathroom; he’d rather write odes to Aretha Franklin and Hole. While he’s adamant—bratty, even—about his distaste for the word “natural,” over the course of the book we see him confronting the assimilationist, historical, colonial-white ideas that collude NDN people with nature. The closer his people were identified with the “natural world,” he figures, the easier it was to mow them down like the underbrush. But Teebs gradually learns how to interpret constellations through his own lens, along with human nature, sexuality, language, music, and Twitter. Even while he reckons with manifest destiny and genocide and centuries of disenfranchisement, he learns how to have faith in his own voice.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

**A book-length poem about how an American Indian writer can’t bring himself to write about nature, but is forced to reckon with colonial-white stereotypes, manifest destiny, and his own identity as an young, queer, urban-dwelling poet.

A Best Book of the Year at BuzzFeed, Interview, and more.**

** **

Nature Poem follows Teebs—a young, queer, American Indian (or NDN) poet—who can’t bring himself to write a nature poem. For the reservation-born, urban-dwelling hipster, the exercise feels stereotypical, reductive, and boring. He hates nature. He prefers city lights to the night sky. He’d slap a tree across the face. He’d rather write a mountain of hashtag punchlines about death and give head in a pizza-parlor bathroom; he’d rather write odes to Aretha Franklin and Hole. While he’s adamant—bratty, even—about his distaste for the word “natural,” over the course of the book we see him confronting the assimilationist, historical, colonial-white ideas that collude NDN people with nature. The closer his people were identified with the “natural world,” he figures, the easier it was to mow them down like the underbrush. But Teebs gradually learns how to interpret constellations through his own lens, along with human nature, sexuality, language, music, and Twitter. Even while he reckons with manifest destiny and genocide and centuries of disenfranchisement, he learns how to have faith in his own voice.

More books from Tin House Books

Cover of the book Loitering: New and Collected Essays by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book The Little General and the Giant Snowflake by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book The Coyote's Bicycle: The Untold Story of 7,000 Bicycles and the Rise of a Borderland Empire by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book Why Do Fools Fall In Love: A Realist's Guide to Romance by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book The Dart League King: A Novel by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book The Sickness by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book Someone Else's Wedding Vows by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book November 22, 1963: A Novel by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book Hot Art: Chasing Thieves and Detectives Through the Secret World of Stolen Art by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book Cities of Refuge by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book No One by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book Tin House: Tribes (Fall 2014) by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book The Orphan of Salt Winds by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book Tin House: Faith (Tin House Magazine) by Tommy Pico
Cover of the book Nine Folds Make a Paper Swan by Tommy Pico
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy