Link 'Em, Danno

I've been excited about the work of Kathleen Flenniken as of late, and just ordered my copy of Famous. I love the cover art--it reminds me of a Diane Arbus photo that shows a family's neat, empty, living room at Christmastime (oddly permeated with disturbance, like all her compositions). If I had the money and leverage, I would love to use an Arbus photo for a book cover. Or artwork by Joseph Cornell. Or Ross Bleckner.

Hmmm. I may need to acquire more money.

Here's one poem I hope Flenniken put in the book:

NATURAL HISTORY

When I die, lava will flow and preserve me whole
for 50,000 years. I’ll be exhibited in a great museum,
next to the whale bones and amethyst geodes.

You’ll be pinned with the butterflies,
handled with gloves, exquisitely fragile.

Isn’t it funny they’ll never connect us?
This rock woman with that paper man?
They were never in love.
She would have pounded him into dust.
He’d have been crushed by a woman like that.

--Kathleen Flenniken,
first published in Mid-American Review (Spring 2004)

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It makes me very happy to have my work mentioned here. Such good company!

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Has anyone out there used the Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetics recently, as a student or teacher? The editors are working on the fourth edition (revisiting all 1700 entries!), and looking for suggestions for improvement or notice of things that are lacking. Please leave feedback in the comments box, and I'll pass it along.