Vanitas: Poems

vanitas: A still-life painting of a 17th-century Dutch genre incorporating symbols of mortality or mutability. —The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary Jane McKinley weaves together memories, myths, and interior worlds to create a vanitas of her own. With an oboist's mastery of rhythm and form and a painterly eye for detail, the poet retraces scenes from her childhood, allowing us to witness its shattering conclusion: the death of a beloved sister and its silent aftershocks.