Poetry. Question: When is a poet's first book a reader? Answer: When you're Garrett Caples, whose poetic persona is often-perverse, decidedly-decisive, randomly-rule-breaking and impoetically-casual. Yet, through it all, the reader experiences the pleasures and charms of reading a forbidden journal, written by a smart young writer. Zoom antics bewilder conscientious drones, evidently forcing garreteers' hands, ink-juiced knuckle labor; madhouse newspsper obituary publishers query radio scribblers' transparent unconscious voices while xrays yelp (from Sixes and Sevens and Sixes: A Poetics).

Author Hometown: Oakland, CA USA



About the author: Born in Lawrence, MA in 1972, Garrett Caples is a poet living in Oakland, CA. He is the author of The Garrett Caples Reader (Angle Press/Black Square Editions, 1999), er um (Meritage Press, 2002), and The Philistine's Guide to Hip Hop (Ninevolt, 2004). He has published numerous essays, articles, and reviews. He currently writes on hip hop for the San Francisco Bay Guardian.