The Near and Distant World: Poems

A vivid, enthralling new collection of poems from the Vermont Poet Laureate and award-winning author of What is Otherwise Infinite, The Möbius Strip Club of Grief, and Someone Else’s Wedding Vows

In her latest, brilliant collection, Bianca Stone continues to explore and interrogate the full spectrum of life, from an unexpectedly intimate conversation with an internet technician in Brooklyn, to a deep dive into Greek mythology, psychoanalysis, and modern philosophy. ＂I am thinking of what it means to be alive in this world,＂ Stone muses, ＂I want to get it not right but near.＂ With her signature incisive perspective, Stone debates the paradoxes of finding one’s own self amid parenthood, global change, and the constant press of mortality.

In these fifty-one poems, Stone seamlessly ties together allusions to Jordan Peele’s Nope, Rilke’s elegies, and other cultural touchstones to arrive at new revelations. With fluidity and wryness, she brings readers to the brink of psychic wounds, operatic dramas, and strange dreams, with a fresh narrative in the rich mytho-poetic tradition.

BIANCA STONE is a Vermont-based poet and scholar currently serving as Vermont’s poet laureate. Stone is the author of over many books, including the poetry collections What is Otherwise Infinite which received the 2022 Vermont Book Award and The Near and Distant World, out from Tin House in 2026. Her poetry and writings have appeared widely in such magazines as The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Poets and Writers, The Nation and the Best American Poetry series. In 2013 she co-founded the poetry-based nonprofit, Ruth Stone House, where she organizes events and retreats, teaches classes on poetry and poetic study, hosts the Ode & Psyche Podcast.