{"product_id":"9780821445488","title":"Animal Purpose: Poems","description":"\u003cb\u003e“Burke’s tender and brave poems refuse to turn away from the cruelties of the world, both the kind we endure and the kind we unwittingly inflict—and yet, even as they bear witness, they insist on joy. And tilt towards hope. And pry beauty from unlikely places.” —Lia Purpura\u003c\/b\u003e  \u003cp\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eAnimal Purpose,\u003c\/i\u003e Michelle Y. Burke explores the lives of men and women as they stand poised between the desire to love and the compulsion to harm. In one poem, a woman teaches a farmhand the proper way to slaughter a truckload of chickens. In another, a couple confronts the recent loss of a loved one when a stranger makes an unexpected confession in a crowded restaurant. Set in both rural and urban spaces, these poems challenge received ideas about work, gender, and place. Danger blurs into beauty and back again. Burke scours the hard edges of the world to find “fleeting softness,” which she wishes “into the world like pollen that covers everything.”\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Ohio University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47118878081264,"sku":"9780821445488","price":13.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9780821445488_p0.jpg?v=1763750261","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9780821445488","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}