American Happiness: New Poems - Paperback

by Jacqueline Allen Trimble (Author)

Winner of the Balcones Poetry Prize

American Happiness is an eclectic collection of verse from a bold poet of everyday life, Jacqueline Allen Trimble. Ironically titled, the work addresses everything from the death of parents to racial tension to the encroachment of coyotes into urban spaces.

The title is taken from a poem in the book which considers the kinder, gentler exploits of Sheriff Andy and Deputy Barney during a time when Southern law enforcement was neither universally kind or gentle. Says Trimble, "Barney had one bullet/and no need for a rope./The only burning he did was for his Thelma Lou."

On her poetic journey, which takes us from the personal to the political, Trimble probes our racial divide. She is by turns compassionate and fierce, cutting at our hypocrisy with the knife of her words and willing us toward our better common humanity.

Author Biography

JACQUELINE ALLEN TRIMBLE lives and writes in Montgomery, Alabama, where she is a professor of English and the chairperson of Languages and Literatures at Alabama State University. Serving as the Poet Laureate for the State of Alabama from 2026 to 2030, she is also a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow, a Cave Canem Fellow, and a two-time Alabama State Council on the Arts Fellow. American Happiness, her first poetry collection, won the Balcones Poetry Prize, and How to Survive the Apocalypse was named one of the ten best poetry books of 2022 by the New York Public Library. Her work has appeared in various publications, including The Griot, The Offing, and The Blue Lake Review.