Jonathan Lethem mined similar territory earlier this year in his delightful book, As She Climbed Across the Table, and now Winterson enters the lists with not one, but two physicists populating the pages of her equally wonderful book, Gut Symmetries. If you think about it, physics does make a good metaphor for love, encompassing as it does the principles of attraction, the exchange of energy, and unification. At the center of this meditation on "the intelligence of the universe" and "the stupidity of humankind" are Jove, a married physicist; Alice, a single physicist who becomes his mistress; and Stella, Jove's wife and later, Alice's lover. They meet on the QE2 and from there the three participants in the story take turns telling their versions of it. Gut Symmetries is a collage of memories, snippets of scientific theory, meditations on abstract concepts like truth, and the events surrounding Jove, Alice, and Stella's affair. This is a book that demands your attention, jumping as it does from one seemingly tangential topic to another; but whereas physics still seeks a grand unification theory (GUT) to explain how everything in the universe fits together, Winterson actually finds one of her own in this satisfyingly complete fictional world.

    This bruising collection of poems puts a blade and a microscope to nostalgia, tradition, race, apology, and sexuality, in order to find beauty in a flawed world. His work has been described as an astounding testament to the power and necessity of confession.

    Gatwood's poems deftly deconstruct traditional stereotypes. The focus shifts from childhood to adulthood, gender to sexuality, violence to joy. And always and inexorably, the book moves toward celebration, culminating in a series of odes: odes to the body, to tough women, to embracing your own journey in all its failures and triumphs.

    A collection of fiction by and about gay men features original stories from Larry Kramer, Edmund White, Christopher Coe, Michael Cunningham, and other writers and explores the tragedies and triumphs of AIDS.

    Christ has just been crucified, and they are heartbroken—until a third man joins them on the road and comforts them. Once they reach Emmaus and break bread, the pair realizes they have been walking with Christ himself. But in the moment they recognize him, he disappears. Spencer Reece draws on this tender story in his mesmerizing collection—one that fearlessly confronts love and its loss, despair and its consolation, and faith in all of its various guises.Reece’s central figure in The Road to Emmaus is a middle-aged man who becomes a priest in the Episcopal Church; these poems follow him to New York City, to Honduras, to a hospital where he works as a chaplain, to a prison, to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. With language of simple, lyrical beauty that gradually accrues weight and momentum, Reece spins compelling dramas out of small moments: the speaker, living among a group of orphans, wondering "Was it true, what they said, that a priest is a house lit up?"; two men finding each other at a Coming Out Group; a man trying to become visible after a life that had depended on not being seen.A yearning for connection, an ache of loneliness, and the instant of love disappearing before our eyes haunt this long-awaited second collection from Spencer Reece.

    When she finds out her girlfriend has lied to her, the world she thought she'd carefully built for herself begins to unravel, and Maria sets out on a journey that will most certainly change her forever.

    The sleepless body hammering a nail nails itself, hanging crucified.--from "Catullus: Excrucior" In Frank Bidart's collection of poems, the encounter with desire is the encounter with destiny. The first half contains some of Bidart's most luminous and intimate work-poems about the art of writing, Eros, and the desolations and mirror of history (in a spectacular narrative based on Tacitus). The second half of the book exts the overt lyricism of the opening section into even more ambitious territory-"The Second Hour of the Night" may be Bidart's most profound and complex meditation on the illusion of will, his most seductive dramatic poem to date.Desire is a 1997 National Book Award Finalist for Poetry.

    Besieged by the press, his widow Millie flees to a remote Scottish village, where she seeks solace in memories of their marriage. The reminiscences of those who knew Joss Moody render a moving portrait of a shared life founded on an intricate lie, one that preserved a rare, unconditional love.

    This anthology, spanning work of the last 75 years, will broaden its readers' notions of what defines erotic poetry. For what is more intriguing, more satisfying than strong, self-assured writing? This groundbreaking anthology includes some of our most powerful women writers--among them Sharon Olds, Elizabeth Alexander, Anne Sexton, Dorianne Laux, Denise Levertov, Adrienne Rich, Lucille Clifton, and Louise Gl�ck. These poets fully demonstrate that, far from being prurient, the erotic can permeate even the most mundane aspects of life, from reading a book to buying clothes. At the same time, the collection affirms the enormous meaningfulness of poetry--its ability to express the inexpressible and to illuminate the most private and intimate of human experiences. The poets included here represent different ethnicities, geographies, social classes, and sexual preferences. The only characteristic they share is that they are women writing about sex.

    Well, I tell you this: 'Prickly race, who know nothing except how to eat out your hearts with envy, you don't eat cunt'... Edited by Sylvere Lotringer and published in 1991, this handy, pocket-sized collection of some early and not-so-early work by the mistress of gut-level fiction-making, Hannibal Lecter, My Father gathers together Acker's raw, brilliant, emotional and cerebral texts from 1970s, including the self-published 'zines written under the nom-de-plume, The Black Tarantula. This volume features, among others, the full text of Acker's opera, The Birth of the Poet, produced at Brooklyn Academy of Music in 1985, Algeria, 1979 and fragments of Politics, written at the age of 21. Also included is the longest and definitive interview Acker ever gave over two years: a chatty, intriguing and delightfully self-deprecating conversation with Semiotext(e) editor Sylvere Lotringer--which is trippy enough in itself as Lotringer, besides being a real person, has appeared as a character in Acker's fiction. And last, but not least, is the full transcript of the decision reached by West Germany's Federal Inspection Office for Publications Harmful to Minors in which Acker's work was judged to be not only youth-threatening but also dangerous to adults, and subsequently banned. Acker is the sort of the writer that should be read first at 16, so that you can spend the rest of your life trying to figure her out; she confuses, infuriates, perplexes and then all of a sudden the writing seems to be in your bloodstream, like some kind of benign virus. She's definitely not for the easily offended--but then, there are worse things in life than being offended. Such as the things that Acker writes about...

    Nobody could have expected what would happen when the story continued. Collected here is the entire trilogy of Chuck Tingle’s history making Space Raptor Butt series.SPACE RAPTOR BUTT INVASIONSpace can be a lonely place, especially when you’re stationed by yourself on the distant planet Zorbus. In fact, Lance isn’t quite sure that can last the whole year before his shuttle pod arrives, but when a mysterious visitor appears at Lance’s terraforming station, he quickly realizes that he might not be so alone after all. Soon enough, Lance becomes close with this mysterious new astronaut, a velociraptor. Together, they form an unlikely duo, which quickly begins to cross the boundaries of friendship into something much, much more sensual. It’s not gay if it’s a man and a dinosaur, is it? SPACE RAPTOR BUTT REDEMPTIONAfter a year stationed on planet Zorbus, astronaut Lance Tanner and his raptor lover Orion return home to find that they are not greeted as heroes, but as villains. Unbeknownst to Lance, his space travels have been funded by the villainous Scoundrels Inc, a corporation that has deep ties to the illegal trade of unicorn tears and a destructive mining project at the core of the earth. Now Lance is on trial for a number of false charges; from having connections to the wicked Scoundrels, to being too strange for space. The opposing lawyer argues that space is only for serious astronauts, and that love between a raptor and a man is giving space travel a bad name. Lance is arguing that there’s room to be weird in space. More importantly, Lance is arguing for the idea of love itself; that just because something comes out of darkness doesn’t mean it can’t become a beacon of light. Of course, this all culminates in a hardcore dinosaur on astronaut pounding that will have your jaw on the courtroom floor! SPACE RAPTOR BUTT ASCENSIONSoon after blasting off on their mission to find refuge for the people of Earth 1 on the dinosaur inhabited Earth 2, Orion and his space raptor lover Lance find a spaceship stow away, the notorious CEO of Scounrels Inc, Vam Dox. Vam claims that his intentions are pure, but it’s hard to trust such a sad, strange man. After landing in Hugona, the planet capital of Earth 2, our heroes restrain Vam Dox and head off to secure an important diplomatic relationship with the pterodactyl president, but that’s when all hell breaks loose. Soon, Vam Dox is storming the capital with a band of rabid dogs, and Lance and Orion are wrongly taking the blame! Fortunately, Lance and Orion know that the only cure for evil this strong is to prove their love in a hardcore gay encounter at the steps of the capital building. When the smoke clears, will Vam Dox be revealed as the super villain that he claims to be, or a meek, lonesome manbaby who is starved for attention?

    Here are 18 stories, all about love, and about all kinds of love. From the aching for the one you pine for, to standing up and speaking up for the one you love, to pure joy and happiness, these love stories run the gamut of that emotion that at some point has turned every one of us inside out and upside down. What is love? With this original story collection David Levithan proves that love is a many splendored thing, a varied, complicated, addictive, wonderful thing.

    His affecting words cover topics from politics to prejudice, from the human spirit to the individual obstacles he faces every day in his solitary life.

    Based on the myth of the blind prophet Tiresias, Hold Your Own is a riveting tale of youth and experience, sex and love, wealth and poverty, community and alienation. Walking in the forest one morning, a young man disturbs two copulating snakes - and is punished by the goddess Hera, who turns him into a woman. This is only the beginning of his journey . . . Weaving elements of classical myth, autobiography and social commentary, Tempest uses the story of the gender-switching, clairvoyant Tiresias to create four sequences of poems: 'childhood', 'manhood', 'womanhood' and 'blind profit'. The result is a rhythmically hypnotic tour de force - and a hugely ambitious leap forward for one of the UK's most talented and compelling young writers.

    “a new poet explodes into the scene with a dark, fantastical, & all-too-relatable voice. you will consider this your new friendship breakup soundtrack.” — Amanda Lovelace, Author of the princess saves herself in this one“Riveting, thought-provoking and elegant, Water Runs Red will tug at your heartstrings and mend your soul in one fell swoop.” — Sasha Alsberg, #1 NYT Bestselling Author of ZENITH: The Androma Saga