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“I was only born into the world,” begins one of Vincent Colistro’s poems, “didn’t invade it, didn’t ransom it for a nicer one.” The Late Victorians, Colistro’s debut, is a beguilingly irreverent investigation of the life he was “born into.” Hyper-fluent, riding wave after wave of copious invention, Colistro builds his weirdness from scratch, turning simple ideas into sense-resisting parables full of deranged twists and dizzying embellishments. (“We Rick-rolled, we raised / pre-flop, we flapped our pool noodles / at each other’s caboose.”) Wily, witty, and packed with brilliant sleights of hand, The Late Victorians announces an original talent.
