Lookout Man

Stuart Dischell is the author of six collections of poetry, including Dig Safe, Backwards Days, and Children with Enemies, the latter also published by the University of Chicago Press. His first collection, Good Hope Road, was selected for the National Poetry Series, and he has received fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Ledig-Rowohlt Foundation. Dischell teaches in the MFA program in creative writing at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

• AcknowledgmentsONELines of the ProdigalThe ForeignerInside the StatueCoda (Broken, He Saw Himself at Last)Lines about Ships at SeaLines about MountainsLines about Rivers, Then the SeaLines about the SnowLines about the WindLines above the Tree LineLines of Evolutionary ProgressLines at the End of the YearTWOThe Work ZoneTaintLines in the OutageThe Arcade, 1962White Horse PikeAction in the PacificLines about EmptinessTime Was the RiderLines of the Elderly OrphanLines along the ShoreThe Last Days on Ocean LaneMeeting My Parents for a Weekend in New York, 1988Lines on the Invention of ShoesLines in the BackyardLines about HerFor Hubert DesmarestFor Oksana ShachkoTHREEThe Streets of the CapitalLines on a Train to the AlpsCities of the Blue CoastIn a Corner of the SkyLines in Regard to a Morning SwimThe Measurement of WordsLines of the MirageAfter the ExhibitionThe Enchanted BellsStormy TuesdaysWindow Peeping into the Garden of EdenLines along a Wild PlaceNotes, Elegiac

"[Dischell's] poems are painterly and cinematic—they can be movies that are improvisational and beautifully clear. But don’t let that fool you. His poems show us how we construct ourselves and our affections with language and images of ourselves and others, an imaginative spirit that is also an investigative spirit."