Robert Polito is the editor of the exciting new collection of Manny Farber movie criticism, Farber On Film. But Polito is also an important poet. He’s not, however, self-important: his recent collection Hollywood & God (University of Chicago Press), is frequently like a series of scenes in a thriller, and you, not the poet, discover all the clues. His mysteries can be comic-profound ones.

For example, in the poem “What A Friend,” “your Aunt Barbara” is driving home one night. Her car gets a flat tire. It’s raining. She has a spare but no jack. No one will stop to help her. That is, no one except…

“That’s when Jesus showed up/He lifted up the back of the car, and she changed the tire.”

The poem concludes: “Imagine/Jesus Christ traipsing around like that, helping people get home.”

Polito makes poetry out of pop-culture in a way that deepens, not cheapens, either the poem or the pop. Elvis Presley, the Edgar G. Ulmer thriller Detour, and Dunkin Donuts all put in appearances in poems whose lines snake across the page, wrapping themselves around rhythms that surprise and hypnotize. READ FULL STORY »