In the Absence of Clocks

In the fascinating collection of poems, In the Absence of Clocks, poet Jacob Shores-Arguello takes readers on an illuminating voyage through Ukrainian life. Set during the turmoil of the 2004 Orange Revolution, when the country trembled in the wake of political corruption and public outrage, Shores-Arguello’s lyrics of a revolution provide a glimpse into a world at once foreign and familiar.

Throughout the collection are the iconic images and myriad juxtapositions of Ukrainian life. wolves howling in the snow and bakers pounding early-morning loaves of bread; farmlands and cities alike rocked by political transformation; gypsies and protesters; opulent images of Byzantium and the concrete ghosts of Chernobyl—all meet here at the crossroads of East and West, democracy and communism, reality and mythology. As the narrator travels across the Ukraine, he does much more than cross the distances between Horlivka and Odessa or Kiev and the Black Sea. As the tides of change swirl around him, they mirror his own search for a cultural identity and history.

Jacob Shores-Arguello grew up in the United States and in Costa Rica. He is the recipient of the Fine Arts Work Center Fellowship in Provincetown, the Dzanc Books ILP International Literature Award, and a Fulbright Fellowship to Ukraine.