After Mountains

What does it feel like for the foreign to become familiar, or for the places we know best to become strange? How are human experiences of joy, love, heartbreak, or rage influenced by the landscapes we find ourselves in? In the sharpest and haziest memories, what details of our surroundings stay with us years later?

With her debut poetry chapbook After Mountains, Hailey Pope attempts to answer these questions, or at least look them starkly in the face. The collection draws readers into the places Pope has known and loved, from her home in the Colorado Rockies, to both coasts of the United States, and across the European continent, each poem showcasing Pope's eye for description and her evocative, deeply personal voice.

After Mountains offers a potent meditation on how intimately our emotions connect to the natural and urban landscapes we find ourselves in. From gentle first kisses in foreign elevators to the large-scale devastations of forest fires, the poet reminds us to take a breath, take a look around, and continue "the animal business of living."