The Worrying Stone: Poems by Benjamin D. Carson

“I am haunted by the man on his porch who shot birds. I am haunted by the chorus that erupted. I am haunted by a father Carson was not sure he loved—and the grandfather dismissed by his wife. Even the old Edsel behind the barn stays with me. I am haunted by these poems—the landscapes and characters. The aim of Carson’s words hits the bullseye.”

–Diane Glancy, author of Psalm to Whom(e) and Quadrille

“These are well-made, plain-spoken, sparce, unsentimental poems of profound sensitivity. In his second beautiful collection, Carson gives us a surprisingly enchanted and fierce look at ordinary

life.”

–Clarence Major, author of Four Days in Algeria

Carson’s poems tell stories that rise up from between pasts we can neither return to nor escape from, between what we must become and can never become, between what we might be and will never let ourselves be. The variety of his poetic approaches—from unnerving spareness to exuberant, kaleidoscopic intimacy—helps us see those moments of arising both on the page and in the private space of our own lives. 

–Steven Wingate, author of The Leave-Takers and Of Fathers and Fire.