Judas Goat: Poems

ISBN: 1953534643

Author: Bates, Gabrielle

Condition: New

A Vulture Most Anticipated Book of WinterA Chicago Review of Books , The Millions, Debutiful, and Write or Die Magazine Best Book of JanuaryAn Autostraddle Most Anticipated Queer and Feminist Book of 2023Stellar. . . . with great humanity, grace, and precision. -Nicole Sealey, author of Ordinary BeastGabrielle Batess electric debut collection Judas Goat plumbs the depths of intimate relationships. The books eponymous animal is used to lead sheep to slaughter while its own life is spared, and its harrowing existence echoes through this spellbinding collection of forty poems, which wrestle with betrayal and forced obedience, violence and young womanhood, and the forbidden felt language of sexual and sacred love. These poems conjure encounters with figures from scriptures, domesticated animals eyeing the wild, and mothering as a shapeshifting, spectral force; they question what it means to love another person and how to exorcise childhood fears. All the while, the Deep South haunts, and no matter how far away the speaker moves, the South always draws her back home.In confession, in illumination, Bates establishes herself as an unflinching witness to the risks that desire necessitates, as Judas Goat holds readers close and whispers its unforgettable lines.