Quote for the Day: January 31st, 2022

*Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail* by Cheryl Strayed

The experience was powerful and fundamental. It seemed to me that it had always felt like this to be a human in the wild, and as long as the wild existed it would always feel this way.
Cheryl Strayed, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

Thanks as always for being a faithful reader of The Voracious Bibliophile. If you like what you see, please like, comment, follow, and subscribe to my email list to get notified of new posts as soon as they drop. You can also email me at fred.slusher@thevoraciousbibliophile.com or catch me on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest @voraciousbiblog. Keep reading the world, one page (or pixel) at a time.

Quote for the Day: January 30th, 2022

*Oh, the Places You’ll Go!* by Dr. Seuss

Wherever you fly, you’ll be best of the best. Wherever you go, you will top all the rest. Except when you don’t. Because, sometimes, you won’t.
Dr. Seuss, Oh, the Places You’ll Go!

Quote for the Day: January 29th, 2022

When you make loving others the story of your life, there’s never a final chapter, because the legacy continues. You lend your light to one person, and he or she shines it on another and another and another.
Oprah Winfrey, What I Know for Sure

Quote for the Day: January 28th, 2022

*The Little Prince* by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince

Poem for the Day: January 27th, 2022

American Deathbed by Jiarong Zhang

is boneboat. We make teeth 

from pennies for our American 

toothfairy. We hide them under our 

pillow next to our nectarine 

acetaminophen. Dali mouths 

opening to other mouths 

form this neck of history. 

I’m sucking my pregnancy 

test like a popsicle. I’m 

breastfeeding the sea. 

You’re in bed with 

your video game girlfriend 

except it’s you on the screen, 

you’re playing in the first person 

your lips are kissing your feet. 

You’re smoking a cigarette 

in the deportees club. 

You’re sitting on the toilet 

beside your female-gendered 

tub. I’m watching an old 

woman crawl up the hill 

of the city. I’m baptizing 

myself in the acidachelake. 

The sun is throbbing 

into my throat. For who. 

For who. I’m scalpel 

-ing an ebony. You’re Fishhawk 

Midnight. My naked legs 

bent into the Geese 

-Shaped V. Before we sleep, 

you look out the window 

to see what’s left of me. Out there, 

beyond the American Deathbed, 

you tell me there are lesions of 

kindness. There are birds 

jeweling our sleeps. There 

are hyacinths, just purring. 

I want my mother to see. 

On the moon, you say 

look closely to see 

a child’s TV 

playing infinitely on loop, 

just purring with gravity. 

I want the old song to play 

of my father snoring in his 

sleep. Mother yelling at me to 

leave. In this twilight, 

even anger is so pretty. 

Live for me.

I love how playful Zhang is with language in this poem. From the lesions of kindness to the hyacinths, just purring, every image Zhang conjures is haunting in its specificity while abstract in its execution. In the background of it all is an undercurrent of electricity waiting to zap the attentive reader. American Deathbed is one of those poems you can’t read just once, and the reader willing to give it the time and attention it deserves will not regret the decision.

Quote for the Day: January 27th, 2022

*Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End* by Atul Gawande

Human beings need loyalty. It does not necessarily produce happiness, and can even be painful, but we all require devotion to something more than ourselves for our lives to be endurable.
Atul Gawande, Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End

Poem for the Day: January 26th, 2022

Fresco by Richie Hofmann

I have come again to the perfumed city.
Houses with tiered porches, some decorated with shells.
You know from the windows that the houses
are from a different time. I am not
to blame for what changes, though sometimes 
I have trouble sleeping.
Between the carriage houses,
there are little gardens separated by gates.
Lately, I have been thinking about the gates.
The one ornamented with the brass lion, I remember
it was warm to the touch
even in what passes here for winter.
But last night, when I closed my eyes,
it was not the lion that I pictured first.

Richie Hofmann teaches poetry at Stanford University. His first collection of poetry, Second Empire, was published by Alice James Books in 2015. His forthcoming collection of poetry, A Hundred Lovers, is due to be released by Knopf on February 8th, 2022. His work appears elsewhere in The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, and The Yale Review. You can read more about him and his work on his website.

Quote for the Day: January 26th, 2022

*When Breath Becomes Air* by Paul Kalanithi and Abraham Verghese (Foreword)

Human knowledge is never contained in one person. It grows from the relationships we create between each other and the world, and still, it is never complete.
Paul Kalanithi, When Breath Becomes Air

All Aboard the ARC: I’ll Take Care of You by Maria Loretta Giraldo (Author), Nicoletta Bertelle (Illustrator), and Johanna McCalmont (Translator)

***Note: I received a free digital review copy of this book from NetGalley and Blue Dot Kids Press in exchange for an honest review. I have not received compensation for the inclusion of any links for purchase found in this review or on any other page of The Voracious Bibliophile which mentions I’ll Take Care of You, its creators, or its publisher.***

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Review

This beautiful picture book introduces children to the interconnectedness of nature with a single refrain repeated throughout: “I’ll take care of you.”

This beautiful picture book introduces children to the interconnectedness of nature with a single refrain repeated throughout: “I’ll take care of you.” So says the Earth, the Water, and the Sky to the scared little seed that grows into a strong apple tree. So says the selfsame tree to the blackcap bird who takes shelter in its branches. So says the blackcap bird to her tender hatchling, whom she loves, nourishes, and teaches to fly. So says the blackcap bird to the seed that falls among stones once the apple tree sheds its blossoms and its fruit. The little bird watches over the seed which she entrusts to the Earth’s tender care. She sings to it and hopes for it until one day, a shoot breaks forth and the cycle begins once again.

I’ll Take Care of You is ideal for daycare, preschool, and local Story Time groups, who can reinforce the concepts introduced in the book by performing acts of care for one another and others in their community.

Thus the gift of care is shared and magnified among all of nature and her children in I’ll Take Care of You, and I can’t imagine anyone not enjoying this simple yet powerful tale. Nicoletta Bertelle’s warm and vibrant illustrations reinforce the themes of community and ecological harmony found in Maria Loretta Giraldo’s text, gorgeously translated from the Italian by Johanna McCalmont. I’ll Take Care of You is ideal for daycare, preschool, and local Story Time groups, who can reinforce the concepts introduced in the book by performing acts of care for one another and others in their community.

I’ll Take Care of You is due to be published by Blue Dot Kids Press on April 12th, 2022 and is now available to preorder wherever books are sold.

Quote for the Day: January 25th, 2022

*I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings* by Maya Angelou and Oprah Winfrey (Foreword)

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.
Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings