AN ARCHEOLOGY OF THE FUTURE

Original, reflective, deploying an extensive vocabulary and vibrant verbs, Hoff’s poems rarely stumble. Often written in the first person but not egocentric, they focus on objects, like a plant or pears, items that evoke a place, and people met in the neighborhood. Some forthrightly explore an emotion, as in “How Do I Say Regret?” which expands from the minuscule and overlooked (a dead insect) to ask forgiveness of language itself. “On a Painting by Henri Rousseau,” “The Ambassador,” and several others are poems catalyzed by artworks. There is occasional social commentary, like a poem addressed to Black Panther Bobby Hutton. Most of the poems are free verse, but Hoff also bravely tackles the difficult pantoum. The epigraph and a couple of poems explicitly reference Slovenian absurdist poet Tomaž Šalamun, including an apocalyptic one dedicated to him, though most poems in this volume are more imagist than absurdist. Another end-times poem evokes the future Götterdämmerung. “It All Adds Up to Fun Times” provides explicit instructions: “Look for the hidden cracks inside the mountains. / Walk far to become your background. / Pick one of the many options that dangle before your eyes,” closing with the confident command, “Remember my words….”

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