In the Unwalled City

In the Unwalled City takes its title from Epicurus, whowrote: “Against other things it is possible to obtain security, but when itcomes to death, we human beings all live in an unwalled city.” This affectingbook—which weaves prose memoir with poetry—explores that feeling of being opento attack—in this case the pain of grief after Robert Cording’sthirty-one-year-old son Daniel died.

To borrow a phrase from C.S. Lewis,here is “a grief observed,” encompassing not only the big questions but alsothe impact of grief on daily life. For a poet like Cording, one form that grieftakes is that of speaking to his son. In “Afterlife,” Cording has a vision ofhis son replying: “let the emptiness remain empty . . . Stop writing down /everything you think I’m telling you. / This is your afterlife, not mine.”

At the heart of In the UnwalledCity is a series of questions: How does loss change a person? How does onechart a new life that both acknowledges a son’s death and still finds a wayback to delight? How does one now live fully in the unwalled city?