From the fall of Troy recorded at the beginning of Western poetry to the ongoing mass extinction of species, Twelve Clocks meditates on the temporality of loss across the many scales of our experience and knowledge. Framed by central images of beginnings and ends, this collection searches six cities and intervals of time for the measures of loss, labor, and care. Through formal innovations derived from the second, the minute, the hour, etc., and the methods of their measure, these poems move from the stark violence of Homer’s tale to the terrible precision and power of the atomic age.
As the reader is transported from Las Vegas to Argentina to the landscapes of Ancient Greek epic poetry, Twelve Clocks explores the connections between song, ancestry, family, loss, and time. If the imagery of the collection hints Troy might be an image of the wrecked Argentine economy under neoliberal economics, the poems eschew the abstractions of politics in favor of a vivid and sensuous lyricism.
The interconnectivity of the poems in Twelve Clocks is mirrored by different elements’ transcendence throughout the collection. The clock that goes missing in one poem turns up in another, characters vanish and reappear, matter destroyed in one poem reoccurs as energy in another, and then matter and energy both go missing. Taken together, the poems confront the literary legacy of Western poetic tradition and our shared future.
As the reader is transported from Las Vegas to Argentina to the landscapes of Ancient Greek epic poetry, Twelve Clocks explores the connections between song, ancestry, family, loss, and time. If the imagery of the collection hints Troy might be an image of the wrecked Argentine economy under neoliberal economics, the poems eschew the abstractions of politics in favor of a vivid and sensuous lyricism.
The interconnectivity of the poems in Twelve Clocks is mirrored by different elements’ transcendence throughout the collection. The clock that goes missing in one poem turns up in another, characters vanish and reappear, matter destroyed in one poem reoccurs as energy in another, and then matter and energy both go missing. Taken together, the poems confront the literary legacy of Western poetic tradition and our shared future.
Julie Sophia Paegle’s first book of poems, torch song tango choir, was selected as one of the premiere debuts of 2010 by Poets & Writers, and was recognized in the International Latino Book Awards, and won a Utah Arts Council Award, among others. She teaches at California State University, San Bernardino, where she directs the MFA program. She lives in the San Bernardino Mountains with her husband and their sons.
