Dan Nielsen is a natural master of the tongue-in-cheek poem. He is minimalistic, drives for the point, and his lines are unadorned, straight-forward. The absurdity of childhood and sexual relations predominate here. In "And It Paid Off" he writes: "I remember/ my father/ asking me// what I was doing/ to prepare/ for the future// 'I'm hallucinating,/ dad." When the poet attempts to instruct his son how to recognize a crazy person--describing the way they look and act--the son wants to know if his father is crazy. In the short story "Joe Got Hard", Nielsen introduces a character stoned on acid who attempts to have sex with a fat woman; the situation quickly deteriorates when the woman's biker husband arrives. Much like a real LSD trip, the short story is surreal and disconnected from reality. Nielsen's absurdist observations are a welcome digression from a large body of poetry that is too serious, academic, or often incomprehensible. In addition to his poems, there are drawings and collages, all of which are unmistakably Nielsenesque.--Kurt Nimmo
This review originally appeared in TapRoot Reviews #5,
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