Emigrant from an Imagined Country by James Wyshynski

These poems begin in the mind and land in the heart. Poems of family, of place, both present and past. They are haunting and haunted and honed with precision. the work of a poet attuned to pain. They make time malleable and meaningful. Here is poetry that blurs the line between real and surreal; where loss and beauty coincide. Titles are often staked by place and time, and images recur—sun, ash, door. Through memory’s grip and slip, they tackle unfinished business. Filmic and compelling, this highly accomplished debut is hard-edged and softly sung.
–Catherine Graham, author of Put Flowers Around Us and Pretend We’re Dead: New and Selected Poems (Wolsak and Wynn /Buckrider Books)

In Emigrant from an Imagined Country, meticulous craft meets Wyshynski’s intellect and keen powers of observation, from a teen next door mowing a yard to a sparrow caught in a screened-in-porch. With pages traveling to Ukraine, the Bronx, and Northern Maine, to Macy’s Book Department and the Chicago Institute of Art, these are poems of ancestral exploration, longing, and love. In “Last Will for Three Children,” Wyshynski implores: “turn away and take/ the full step of your selves back into your lives.” I’m bowled over by the compassion, wisdom, and romance in this collection, even in the face of loss and suffering, for as the poet writes: “to stand proud is to stand straight/before a torched world.” Everyone should read Wyshynski. His poems are a steerage of lines you won’t forget.
–Janine Certo, author of O Body of Bliss, Elixir, and In the Corner of the Living.

The book’s title might suggest an imagined country, but the emotional landscapes this poet brings forward are familiar, moving, and very real. These are impactful poems, and James Wyshynski’s book is a country you’ll want to return to again and again.
–Matthew Olzmann, author of Constellation Route, Contradiction in Design, and Mezzanines.