Roadside Press $18.00 https://www.magicaljeep.com/product/prying/71 Limited Edition of 69 The three poets nesting cheek by jowl in this fetching 2022 reprint of the 1997 Four-Sep Publications chapbook Prying from small press dynamo Michele McDannold's Roadside Press will be familiar to anyone paying attention to even the tiniest of the outlaw poetry scene in the last 50 or so years: Charles Bukowski, Catfish McDaris and Jack Micheline. Bukowski and Micheline need little introduction; their long shadows hover over the outlaw poetry world even now years after their deaths. And the third, the only living poet of the three within, Catfish McDaris, has been building his own small press reputation with considerable success, for nearly as long as the former men. Illustrations are from Scott Aicher. It's most fun to talk about the living McDaris. He appeared and appears so widely it's difficult to keep track and critique, or not, but as his portion of the cover copy says, he doesn...
great draft. i would only tinker a bit if at all. ending is fabulous. the only line where the meter seems a tad off is '...basin you catch it in'. also couldn't tell if that line break was intentional or due to formatting. or is that some kind of concrete and intentional break? at any, rate, that little bit stuck in my craw. otherwise, the whole scans fine for me. 'cease and decyst' is a little cute based on the other lines, but i can live with it. i wonder if that phrase can be hinted at using the same sounds with its explicit usage? just my two cents. ignore as necessary.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Gerry. I appreciate you reading this. I wanted the stark two-letter line, but now I dunno. . .
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