{"product_id":"stones-are-the-first-to-rise-9781962847162","title":"Stones are the First to Rise","description":"In Stones Are the First to Rise, Buddha, a U.P.S. driver, and an old woman living in hill country shares space and time with stones and peas and war and climate change, plus explorations of childhood and becoming a particular person. Throughout many of his books, Giannini finds himself working with discrete sets of concerns over the course of months or years, concerns that nevertheless cohere as a single envisioning, a book, as the parts of the body cohere to make body. Antonio Porchia's well-known words are appropriate here: \"I know what I have given you. I don't know what you have received.\" The book is now in your hands.SAMPLE POEM: \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eStones Are the First to Rise \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe stones talk to each other, just as we do. . . .\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e- \u003c\/em\u003eKatsumahtauta (U.S. West Coast tribal elder)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e to anthropologist-linguist Jaime de Angulo\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e1.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRain pushing the night down\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ethrough melting snow, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e entering earth \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eand we felt safe enough \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eafter the storm. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e We stayed in the ground.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNight could then be turned over\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ein the morning. . .the dark clods\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eand puddles with clouds we didn't crush.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNight was coming up through the soil\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eand vanishing. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAmong our kind, that same small stone \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eturning up, as it did every year, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ealways rising before us, blind eye\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ein the night of dirt. Filthy\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ewith what it couldn't see, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eas a child without a mirror can't see\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eits smeared face. Nothing Romantic\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eor playful. Nothing green. Ancient.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIt seemed without knowledge\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eof what or why it was, surfacing\u003c\/p\u003ewet and splotchy, a single syllable: stone.2. \u003cem\u003e-in late spring\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cp\u003eA man began telling\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ethe crushed stones\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ein the truck-bed\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eeach had the right to remain\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003esilent. Not one listened.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen they were lifted\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ehigher and higher, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003edumped\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eloudly into their gray language, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003etheir heaped syntax\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e(no one could decipher)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eon the ground. 'One rake\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003edeserves another, ' said a worker, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eas she and co-worker began\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003espreading sentences of granite\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003euntil the whole story became clear: \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ethe fresh path we could walk\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003elistening to the small nouns, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ethe ancient ones, turning under our feet, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ehow they depend, as we all do, \u003c\/p\u003eon boundaries, boulders at the edge.\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"DOS Madres Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51175708852498,"sku":"9781962847162","price":15.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_7ee50d6b-2a7e-4530-b961-e645d9e885e3.jpg?v=1744293282","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/stones-are-the-first-to-rise-9781962847162","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}