The Nancy Book is a pleasure, and Ed Dorn Live should be required reading.
But these days pictures delight me more than most writing/poetry that comes through the door; although a few smaller publishers still interest — Barque Press, Flood Editions and Bootstrap Productions for instance. This week I’ve enjoyed Ryan Gallagher’s translation of
The Complete Poems of Gaius Valerius Catullus from Bootstrap (who also published Geoffrey Young’s fine The Riot Act, and John Wieners’ Book of Prophecies).
Mark Terrill’s
Something Red, which I read (ouch) last night, completely justifies the small-press ethos. I can’t think of any major publisher who would have issued this sharp collection of illuminations/epiphanies Twenty-eight pieces, each a single sentence: fourteen of them illustrated with the paper-fragments of a life (sonnet echoes). Tiny movies with thought-tracks. I was reminded of the days of Stephen Emerson’s Neighbors, Dale Herd’s Diamonds and, more recently, Merrill Gilfillan’s Magpie Rising. Only fifty copies: well-produced and reasonably priced.