Where the Men Come From by N.W. Downs

About the book: A poetry chapbook exploring religion's conflict with the queer body, asking whether either of them remain sacred after [god] has been called in to account for his actions.

About the author: Downs lives in Chicago with his cat where he writes infrequently, paints badly, and generally goes about his own business. His poems and short stories have been published here and there, and at the moment he shares most of his unpublished work on Instagram.

"The poem is too coy, grasping at straws, describing the swell and flex of the universe like everything is beautiful … o how the pomegranate undone is beautiful and not just another broken heart! But for all the sun’s shine and all the bees at once, N.W. Downs' Where the Men Come From throttles into the difficult and dangerous world, into the unwanting of a body, the unwanting of a master, father, god. The world is too much with us and yet our loneliness is all consuming. Down’s mournful and nimble poems touch tenderness and romance with the severity of an enduring myth, disposing of biblical lies and offering affirmations for sharp thoughts, crumbling marble arches, the wild shape of an identity, a life.

In Where the Men Come From the poem is the [god] coffin. The  poem is “damage control” -- holding the damage done to us and about us when we touch god living stubbornly furious lives, fathering our own feral souls as we yearn for whitehot light." —germ lynn, author of PRESSURED SPEECH

"I’m the gun in the first act.

In his debut collection, poet N.W. Downs takes religion, desire, gender, and violence and holds them up to the light, asking familiar questions in startling ways. Which myth was this one, again? Is that how you like it? What if there isn’t a moral waiting at the end of a poem?

You’re the gun in the third.

Within these deeply personal pages, Downs exposes the intricacies of topics that many refuse to look in the face, showing us that they might not be so separate, after all. Where the Men Come From is an exploration of faith, early adulthood, and queerness through a lens that is truly unique, and questions we may not want the answers to.

Where do the men come from?" —August Hawley

“Extraordinarily clever and vulnerable. Where the Men Come From reads like the diary of a close friend—honest, relatable, poignant. Full of intimate poems that reach into the darkest parts of life, and light them up with a spark of understanding—a book that calls out, breaks open the wound saying “you may not have been there, but you know how this feels.” Brimming with grief, godlessness and the strangeness of existing, Downs’s writing is truly a collection to treasure.” —Melanie Currie, author of Kaleidoscope

“The confounding predicament of Where the Men Come From is that it turns you ravenous, desperate for all of it at once; and yet, it demands to be taken in little bites, savored for every last scrap of sorrow.” —@natashawritesbooks (IG)