books by William Stobb

My books include the National Poetry Series selection, Nervous Systems and Absentia, both published by Penguin Books, the limited edition chapbook of desert fragments, Artifact Eleven, which engages the monumental land-based art of Michael Heizer. In 2019, my latest collection, You Are Still Alive, debuted from 42 Miles Press out of the University of Indiana. It includes poems that have been published in American Poetry Review, Colorado Review, Kenyon Review, and many other top journals. The title phrase is taken (with permission) from the work of visual artist, Landon Sheely. Like all of my work, You Are Still Alive explores a wide tonal range. One poem, “A Moment for Authentic Shine” won the editors’ prize from Spoon River Poetry Review. Final judge David Baker called it a “postmodern corollary to Wordsworth’s Prelude.” But the collection also includes “Sorry I Can’t Design Your Futuristic Bug Creature,” which is a poem about a sci-fi beetle monster (based on the eastern-eye click beetle, but just way bigger and out to destroy humanity), which also won an award: the annual prize of the Science Fiction Poetry Association. To me, they’re like equally loveable siblings—one’s a little bookish and the other is up all night watching Doctor Who.