{"product_id":"things-a-bright-boy-can-do-9781552454978","title":"Things a Bright Boy Can Do","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eIn Michael Chang's latest, all the world's a vaudeville stage, and this poet is its jester with a knife.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLike an elongated diss track, Chang's poems go from flirty to righteous, wrathful to lackadaisical, all in the span of one page. The titans of pop culture and poetry wrestle at Chang's whimsy, their poems a series of flings and retorts at the end of a late-night spree. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLike a compendium of American poetics, this collection breezily changes style and mood as easily as a prom queen smiles beneath the crown. With nods to O'Hara and Ashbery, the poems in \u003ci\u003eThings a Bright Boy Can Do\u003c\/i\u003e flit from the sewage of Americana to the heights of ecstatic experience. Each poem is a playground meant to delight readers before they skip along. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWith each successive book, Michael Chang showcases a poet at home in the twenty-first century; nothing is too silly or too morbid for the page. When reading Chang's poetry, the madness of interpreting the social media age suddenly makes sense. You can't help but join in on the heckling, sticking your tongue out in the face of our strange world.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Michael Chang is back, with their signature irrepressibility: the voice that bubbles with endlessly exuberant wit, encyclopedic pop culture references, playful orthography, and intense emotion. Oh, yes -- these poems are in their feelings! Are you here for poetry that can lure Superman, Dolly Parton, and Prince allusions together? Are you up for parataxis with a vengeance? If wordplay and irreverence are music to your ears, tune into \u003ci\u003eThings a Bright Boy Can Do\u003c\/i\u003e.\" \u003cb\u003e- Evie Shockley, author of \u003ci\u003eSuddenly We\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Michael Chang's \u003ci\u003eThings a Bright Boy Can Do\u003c\/i\u003e pushes and pushes, and then pushes some more. It's provocative, fearless, and relentless, unafraid to reinvent tone, grammar, and just about everything else that dares to enter the path of Chang's perception. \u003ci\u003eThings a Bright Boy Can Do\u003c\/i\u003e is a ride on the back of a new modern language.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e- \u003c\/i\u003eVictoria Chang, author of\u003ci\u003e The Trees Witness Everything\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eMichael Chang\u003c\/b\u003e (they\/them) is the author of \u003ci\u003eSynthetic Jungle\u003c\/i\u003e (Northwestern University Press, 2023), \u003ci\u003eToy Soldiers\u003c\/i\u003e (Action, Spectacle, 2024), and \u003ci\u003eThings a Bright Boy Can Do\u003c\/i\u003e (Coach House Books, 2025). They edit poetry at \u003ci\u003eFence\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Coach House Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51298598813970,"sku":"9781552454978","price":13.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_9bfef2f3-2bf0-4bab-a596-7a37ce5addd8.jpg?v=1747829214","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/things-a-bright-boy-can-do-9781552454978","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}