American Anthem by Kelly Michels ocean vuong Apophthegms (2017) and Whitman and

Apophthegms (2017) and Whitman and Truth (2022)

a taxidermist tends animals in their after-life

and the Irish painter and storyteller

The earlier poems appeared in Ground Signs (Flarestack Poets

turn out to be poems

American Anthem by Kelly Michels ocean vuong Apophthegms (2017) and Whitman andAfter spending a week sleeping on the floor of a crack house she comes home dragging a heap of bones. So begins Kelly Michels sometimes shocking debut as the author remembers observing her mother. Blending lyric and narrative modes the dominant strands of American Anthem focus on the tragedies, both personal and national, of the opioid epidemic and its devastating effects of addiction and of gun violence in America where the author grew up. Drawing on