My Stunt Double

Travis Denton makes me think that attention is akin to affection, at least here, where loss and damage continually lead us deeper into the world, not away from it. While he has a fluid and curious mind, I think he roves to stay, that a belief in the value of all things underlies these peripatetic poems. Some poets write nervously, out of fear. I think Travis Denton writes largely out of joy, to gather and bring what he finds back for us to share. This book is a harvest.

-Bob Hicok, author Elegy Owed

I love the unstoppable, urgently animated force of imagination in Travis Den­ton's work. I love his large-hearted need to take us all to the place beyond the mere narrative, to propel our bodies out in the open, into myth-time. I love his astonishment at the elegiac music of our world, that "curiosity like one tilting over the lip of the cliff." I love his insistence on truth, even if in danger to find oneself lost, "an urban explorer without a map of the trains." Which is to say I love his insistence on the lyric moment. The lyricism is everywhere in these pages. Here is a poet whose tenderness towards people around him, towards our ageing, disappearing bodies is apparent in each image, each turn of phrase. Yet he isn't one to despair. Far from it. Read these poems, and I promise again and again, Travis Denton's fiery imagination and compassionate detail will win you over. You will become one of his loyal readers; I know I am.

-Ilya Kaminsky, author Dancing in Odessa and Deaf Republic

Travis Denton is a fine poet with an explosive imagination and a keen ear. His work only keeps getting better.

-Stephen Dobyns, author The Day's Last Light Reddens the Leaves of the Copper Beech