Of This River is an impressive debut collection of poetry with a distinct Appalachian theme. Noah Davis is one to watch.

A stunning debut collection of poetry focusing on the hardscrabble lives of people in Appalachia, particularly children, and their connection with the natural world there. Beautiful, poignant, and at times heartbreaking, this is a highly recommended book from a poet I look forward to reading more of.

Of This River - Noah Davis (2020) Wheelbarrow Books

I don’t know if I have read such a disconcerting yet vivid and even a little magical book of poems. In some ways Davis’ book, Of this River, flirts with the ethereal yet is so earthy you feel as though you’d get Appalachian mud between your teethe if you read it aloud. This short book is Davis’ debut and there is no doubt as to why he deserves a book. I hope for many more.

Lines such as the following have caught me in the space between living and perishing:

“I didn’t like to hunt at night…I feared that once I unbound the spirit from the body it might have trouble seeing in the dark and come barreling into me.” From “February New Moon”

Why wouldn’t this be an honest fear of a kid who hunts? I couldn’t pull the trash can out to the curb without running back into my suburban house. I felt that I could always relate to the imagery; the metaphor was so obvious, but fresh; and it was just dark enough to read onto the next word as though a next step, unawares of what was coming, but the danger that was always lurking. Masterful.

As a city kid I am enthralled by urban things - buildings, river walks, the birds peering down on this conglomeration we call population. But Davis has made me appreciate what I can only imagine as the backwoods. The river haunts. It is full of the drowned. It carries away and takes life. But it is a provider of life and the hunter is who kills. Bear meat is a frequent image in this book - the power turned fragile, the river lures the bear for a meal and it becomes the meal for the hunter. This hunter then later kneels by the banks where the Short-Haired Girl drowned. And in Davis words, the Short-Haired Girl is a living memory throughout.

I recommend the book and will look for Davis’s future works.

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After squalls fill the hollow

I fear the light,
which has nearly folded
its purple into laurel,

will splinter on a porcupine’s orange teeth
as it rakes the white ribs of a dead coyote..

From "Winter Solstice"

Of This River by Noah Davis is the poets first published collection. His poems and prose have appeared in Best New Poets, Orion Magazine, North American Review, River Teeth Journal, Sou'wester, and Chautauqua. George Ella Lyon selected Of this River for the 2019 Wheelbarrow Emerging Poet Book Contest from Michigan State University's Center for Poetry.

Of this River stands out as an outstanding collection of contemporary poetry. The Appalachian theme that runs through the collection creates a subtle but vivid environment. Unlike many works that overstate themes, however, here the reader wades in and finds himself or herself emersed in the poetry. The water theme is nearly always present and anchors the poems together along with the short-haired girl. The connection between the water and the girl seems almost Woolfish.

The mythology that runs through the poems, although local, seems to have a Native American feel to the stories. It is very much in touch with the land rather than a being. A stunning collection that connects, explores, expresses life in the remote setting.