Redshift - C. W. Buckley

A poetic reckoning for the cosmic and cultural forces pulling us apart.

Cascadian poet C.W. Buckley questions the autocratic estrangement and cultural atomization that grips the American soul. From outer heavens to inner worlds, Redshift journeys with the reader through a shared sense of fragmentation and loss, mapping the way through a highly personal lens of memory, faith, and the natural world to search for what still binds us together. Buckley eschews the obsolete dichotomy of "religious" or "political," aiming instead for a poetry of morality. The resulting collection-equal parts Divine Comedy and esoteric Yelp review-is a spirited collection that ranges freely between old growth forest and the grocery aisle. From a childhood in California’s Arroyo Las Positas watershed to parenthood in Cascadia’s Cedar River watershed, Redshift charts the drift of a fracturing world, mapping the unseen currents stirring us to life and conscience. For anyone decrying the decline of shared meaning, this collection is an unapologetic comfort, a gathering of voices for the disillusioned, the curious, and the searching.