Arne Weingart deals in a wisdom born of the quotidian. From doorbells to jeans to caterpillars, in language equal parts sardonic and sublime, he goads us to look at ourselves and consider “whatever we are” in relation to giant subterranean mushrooms, Jimi Hendrix and Mozart, or “the very breath of God.” This may be uncomfortable, he agrees. We may have to accept that we “also are the answer/to no one’s prayer.” But there will also be laughter “in the museum of sex” and, if we are very lucky, we may, on our best days “remember how to become something/that sheds history like a sad old coat and takes flight.”—Anna V.Q. Ross