The Second Is Thirst
That’s some juicy chap, Jane. The Henriksen’s have released Jane Gregory’s first book, THE SECOND IS THIRST, in an edition of 100 at the low price of seven smackers. I’d say, after spending a bit of time with it this morning, you’re getting a deal. Matt and Katy put each copy together themselves, so the book has that handmade feel only true small press conniseurs can achieve. You might want to order before they’re all gone…
Jane’s work reminds me of Dan Hoy’s. But here’re two from the chap itself to help you decide.
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MIRROR THEORY
If the shadow of purple is purplish
do you think my car will be safe here
during Hedda Gabler and afterwards
if you opine on myth I’ll open
a fifth while the clocks are
doing terribly. Nothing stalks
no circular hour. The digital hand
the hard connection for instance
forehead, windshield. Holding a pole.
Avoiding an actress. Holding anything but
threads: when I move closer it goes.
Look, or get drunk like dusty
quicksand. Tell me the truth. Stop
by the funeral. Where Herzog said
he didn’t know the color of his own eyes.
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FIAT NOX
“Fatigue is the organic realisation of a preconceived idea. Begin by not thinking it.” –Proust
An idea is a hat made. If it ends up on a bed
or a table, this particular hat was a bad idea.
The verb To Use describes the action that was needed To Make
a bloody lapel. Although, that may not be so.
Coming down the stairs something in the garbage
I’m carrying keeps banging against the wall.
There are things that make one want to beat oneself
between thinking about and not thinking about that banging thing:
between being the first to look away but the last
to know everyone wants to: between screaming at an empty mirror and
the first rule of magic. A kid that tells on another kid is a dead kid.
It’s not that I miss being barefoot it’s that
it doesn’t even occur to me. Not contemplating
the axe. Not hugging the machine.
–Jane Gregory, from The Second Is Thirst
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AMY KING View All →
Amy King is the recipient of the 2015 Winner of the Women’s National Book Association (WNBA) Award. Her latest collection, The Missing Museum, is a winner of the 2015 Tarpaulin Sky Book Prize. She co-edited with Heidi Lynn Staples the anthology Big Energy Poets of the Anthropocene: When Ecopoets Think Climate Change. She also co-edits the anthology series, Bettering American Poetry, and is a professor of creative writing at SUNY Nassau Community College.
AMY KING 