Brief History of North American Youth, Stephen Burt

5th in the WinteRed series, Brief History of North American Youth, features new work by Twin Cities poet and critic, Stephen Burt.


excerpt from Brief History of North American Youth


Spring pinches as it enters in the style of a foreign

eye or garment quizzically over the market's final square

outdoors the household keeps warm keeping in

the ancient of days the last novices practice their weave

their crabapples and their demography barricades

against the inexplicable the roar

of the material victory whose bracing

final snow abandons every year


STEPHEN BURT teaches English at Macalester College in Saint Paul, MN. He is the author of Randall Jarrell and His Age, as well as two books of poetry, Popular Music (Center of Literary Publishing/University Press of Colorado, 1999) and Parallel Play (Graywolf, 2006). Visit his website at: http://www.accommodatingly.com