One Above & One Below

Erin Belieu

Erin Belieu’s debut, Infanta, was selected for the National Poetry Series and quickly sold through its large first printing. Both The Washington Post and the National Book Critics Circle named it one of the best poetry books of 1993. In her second book, Belieu proves herself a poet worthy of all the recognition. Coaxing a voice of urban chic from the dirt-filled roots of rural tension, these poems are as captivating as any in American poetry. One Above & One Below resists the oppressive limits of traditional gender roles, interrupting power dynamics in this impressive second collection. 

ISBN: 9781556591440

Format: Paperback

About the Author

Erin Belieu was born in Nebraska and educated at The Ohio State University and Boston University. She is the author of Infanta, chosen by Hayden Carruth for the National Poetry Series; One Above & One Below, winner of the Midland Authors Prize and Ohioana Poetry Award; Black Box, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist; Slant Six, a New York Times favorite book of 2014; and Come-Hither Honeycomb (2020), all published by Copper Canyon Press. Her poems have appeared in places such …

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Reviews

“In this new volume, Belieu has met and exceeded the expectations of her early readers.” —Boston Book Review

“Belieu has a youthful, upbeat spirit… a young poet worth watching.” —Library Journal

“Belieu fits a form to every theme… necessary, valuable.” —Publishers Weekly

“Belieu’s poems use a vernacular of their own to suggest a noir world of erotic innuendo and red lights waiting to be run.” —Neon

“I love the combination of lyricality and cynicism, tenderness and toughness in [Belieu’s] work.” —Ann Fisher-Wirth, The Oxford Eagle

“Attentive to the measure of language, Belieu’s writing is precise… Belieu’s voice is as strong and versatile in this second collection as it was in her acclaimed first book, Infanta.” —Rain Taxi

“Unsentimental and unsparing… [One Above & One Below] appeals and astonishes with its well-wrought balance of wit, wonder, and formal control.” —The Antioch Review

“Belieu’s voice is altogether distinct. Here is a poet that [sic] can move with grace and ease… in a voice that seems at times part Emily Dickinson, part Courtney Love… that is always ready to surprise, to astonish and, ultimately, to defy comparison.” —Boston Book Review

“In Belieu’s new poems, there are no answers, only questions that cut us to the quick… Hers is a veil-piercing, illusion-dissembling language.” —Harvard Review