new from dusie

surprisingly enough for this era of instant gratification, it's not often that a publishing project can go from idea to realization in a little over two months. but that's just what susana gardner and i were able to pull off in the latest of her many fabulous ventures: the dusie wee chapbook series. exactly what the name implies, small chapbooks in small print runs, lovingly desgined and crafted. she's already published two titles in this series -- gringostroika by jules boykoff and lotto by kaia sand -- to whose ranks i am honored to be added with my own title, a day in switzerland. available for purchase online, but given the value for the dollar you probably want to just go ahead and get the whole series.

it's so wonderful to see susana finding her groove as a publisher, editor and poet. when she came into the DC scene via kaia and GMU, she right away made her presence and energy felt. hers was always a presence that commanded attention: you knew it was a party whenever she entered the room. then she spirited herself away from us and to switzerland, what must now be more than three years ago, to be a wife and mother. and i remember the emails from her thereafter, how happy she was in her new life but that she seemed to struggle with finding a way to fit the role of poet into that new life. well she has found that way and we are all so much the better for it.

so when she told me in mid-august about her idea for a series of tiny chapbooks and would i contribute, i was excited but felt, as i often feel when asked for work, that i had nothing to submit. but as it happened at the time i was jotting riffs on and responses to and in a book of short poems and aphorisms by francis picabia, who knows, published by hanuman in their notorious 3x4 inch format. and gradually it dawned on me, perhaps when i happened upon a short series of poems in the picabia book called "a day in switzerland," that here was the perfect proposal for susana: a book of wee poems written in, on and off another book of wee poems. i finished the manuscript in a few weeks -- also very unusual for me -- typed it up and sent it out a month later. one month after that, that chapbooks are available.

here is a short excerpt:

1:35 am

I gently dedicate
this poem 
to the one
who sleeps
without our kiss


*

5:08 am

I am wherever
my feet think
to plant me


*

1:54 pm

It is no secret
that my life
has reason enough
to forget me


*

12:20 am

The devil's laughter
eludes me--
he shall be
without his hat


*

1:34 am

Perhaps
everything
floated on
the surface of
a word's sigh

Why don't
you go find
a woman
who loves
you again


*

5:56 am

Braque keeps
a nun in his tunic


*
9:56 pm

I would like to toss
my head out into
our virtual meeting
places so that they
smash and fall skyward


*

7:08 am

Let's
go
have
a
look
at
me


*