It's mid-January. Well, it's past the mid-point now. No one says, "Happy New Year" anymore. But here it is for you, because you're reading this: Happy New Year!
I've got a pile of Puddles of Sky projects lined for 2019, but before I get into them I've got to finish up with one of the projects I started in 2018. My late-fall and early winter was a blur of chapbook fairs, poetry readings, and then the whirlwind of Christmas... so just getting to this now.
"The Clot Thickens" is chapbook of one-line poems by William A. Davison. I first came across William's poetry in Mercury Press's 'Surreal Estate' edited by Stuart Ross. William's poems really stood out for me. There's an energy of creation that radiates from each one. I feel like each poem is being written while I read it. In the afterword William explained his use of automatic writing, and how he published every poem without a single edit. I thought that was bold, and intriguing. It explained some of that energy that I felt from his work. I especially liked his one-line poems, for the fact that many of them could create amazing shifts and changes, that many poems need 14 or more lines to do. So I tracked William down and asked it he'd like to work on a chapbook of one-line poems. "The Clot Thickens" is the result.
This book took a lot of work to produce. I knew when I started that I wanted a chapbook in which none of the lines need to be broken. The longest poem stretches nearly 11 inches. I knew it also needed to be a short book (in terms of height) because I didn't want too much white space. This meant that each 8.5 by 11 page needed to be cut 7 times. I'm not very good at math, but let's just say, there was a lot of cutting involved.
The stamping of the cover was simple enough. I knew I wanted the title to be in red, an obvious connection to the clot thickening.
The binding was also pretty time consuming. I knew I couldn't staple the binding, as it would have been too tacky, and because there was no folded spine, a Japanese binding was the only option. The one I decided on is something I came up with on my own. I'm really happy with it.
This is a great collection of poems. Surreal, funny, mind-expanding, and thought-provoking. The book itself is a little unwieldy, but I think it makes a great house for these poems.
THE CLOT THICKENS can be purchased HERE
I've got a pile of Puddles of Sky projects lined for 2019, but before I get into them I've got to finish up with one of the projects I started in 2018. My late-fall and early winter was a blur of chapbook fairs, poetry readings, and then the whirlwind of Christmas... so just getting to this now.
"The Clot Thickens" is chapbook of one-line poems by William A. Davison. I first came across William's poetry in Mercury Press's 'Surreal Estate' edited by Stuart Ross. William's poems really stood out for me. There's an energy of creation that radiates from each one. I feel like each poem is being written while I read it. In the afterword William explained his use of automatic writing, and how he published every poem without a single edit. I thought that was bold, and intriguing. It explained some of that energy that I felt from his work. I especially liked his one-line poems, for the fact that many of them could create amazing shifts and changes, that many poems need 14 or more lines to do. So I tracked William down and asked it he'd like to work on a chapbook of one-line poems. "The Clot Thickens" is the result.
This book took a lot of work to produce. I knew when I started that I wanted a chapbook in which none of the lines need to be broken. The longest poem stretches nearly 11 inches. I knew it also needed to be a short book (in terms of height) because I didn't want too much white space. This meant that each 8.5 by 11 page needed to be cut 7 times. I'm not very good at math, but let's just say, there was a lot of cutting involved.
The stamping of the cover was simple enough. I knew I wanted the title to be in red, an obvious connection to the clot thickening.
The binding was also pretty time consuming. I knew I couldn't staple the binding, as it would have been too tacky, and because there was no folded spine, a Japanese binding was the only option. The one I decided on is something I came up with on my own. I'm really happy with it.
This is a great collection of poems. Surreal, funny, mind-expanding, and thought-provoking. The book itself is a little unwieldy, but I think it makes a great house for these poems.
THE CLOT THICKENS can be purchased HERE
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