ZOUNDS!

Aleksander Zywicki's ZOUNDS!, chosen by Kevin Prufer as the winner of the Barrow Street Poetry Book Prize, is a meditative exploration of a lifelong relationship with God, religion, and devotion. "Zounds" is a contraction combining "God's" and "wounds," an early modern exclamation that often edges towards blasphemy, and a literal evocation of Christ's crucifixion wounds. In these poems of family, love, and longing, ZOUNDS! deftly captures the experience of sonic and existential rupture, the wounds sustained in an enduring struggle with faith.