Description
Poetry. SOME NOTES ON MY PROGRAMMING finds Anselm Berrigan once more in funny, irritable, tip-top form. Surveying the Bush-era cultural landscape and not liking what it sees, the poetry herein confronts that reality in terms disgusted ("The group is/an asshole./Self-censorship/is the American avant-garde") and terrifying ("Dreamt I was chopping off fingers/of mine with audience. Not cool"), encompassing odd disclosure ("I don't want my brother to get a job ever") and biting satire ("Osama passes/George the bong/bitching about 21st century/hydroponic weed"). And yet, even if we are all just "Trained Meat," as the title of one poem suggests, the work here never gives in to despair; we may be "under attack/in mourning/all at once" but we also "better make//room for each/grief letting/me see what/lines and/lies/not to take/and how/moment/by moment/to be." A fantastic and necessary book.
Author Bio
Anselm Berrigan is a poet, teacher, and editor of offhand accumulations. He is the author of various books, chapbooks, and other idiosyncratic publications, including PREGRETS (Black Square Editions, 2021), SOMETHING FOR EVERYBODY (Wave Books, 2018), COME IN ALONE (Wave Books, 2016), Zero Star Hotel, They Beat Me Over the Head with a Sack, Free Cell, Notes from Irrelevance, and Skasers (with John Coletti). He is surviving in New York City, and teaching where the work is available.
Author City: NEW YORK, NY USA