Stephanie Balzer
CUEeditions
Tucson, AZ
(c)2009
Prose poetry at its finest. (I know, but it's approaching midnight on a truly terrible year and I wanted to squeeze this in)
Balzer is an extremely talented writer. CUE is a overachieving journal/press. Great things hiding in generically plain covers. It's worth the read, seriously
J. Hope Stein
Hyacinth Girl Press
(c) 2012
Sometimes a chapbook is more than a fancy cover with a black ribbon, sometimes it is meant to be more and is in fact more. This is one of those times. [Mary] : is the 3rd installation of a mixed media project called “The Inventor’s Last Breath,” which includes a 10-minute film that premiered at the Henry Miller Library in 2011, and the chapbook [Talking Doll] : which was published Dancing Girl Press in 2012.
“The Inventor’s Last Breath” gets its title from Thomas Edison’s last breath, which was supposedly captured in a test tube and is on display at the Ford Museum in Michigan. A future installation of the Inventor’s Last Breath may or may not have taken place on her website, jhopestein.wordpress.com (almost 10 years ago now, and the traces of her film have disappeared from the Net).
It is fair to say that Ms. Stein has a highly creative mind as evidenced in her most reason book titled Occasionally, I remove your brain through your nose.
Guy Birchard
Pressed Wafer
Boston, MA
(c) 2003
tiny book of sizable words. The poet lives in Saskatchewan. Or did in 2003 when this collection came out. I like the way Grover on Sesame Street says Saskatchewan. The poems here are thin and tasty. Wherever Moose Jaw is.....
in case/this way two things fell
Beau Beausoleil
Potes & Poets Press
Hartford, CT
(c)1982
Potes & Poets Press has had a long and influential history (1972- 1998) From the University of Connecticut library archives page :
"Potes & Poets Press was a small press founded by poet and publisher Peter Ganick.
Peter Ganick was a private piano teacher, poet, publisher, artst and resident of West Hartford, Connecticut. He was born on December 14, 1946 in Boston, Massachusetts to parents William (an executive in advertising) and Virginia (a legal secretary and pianist). Ganick was raised in Needham, Massachusetts, twelve miles from Boston itself. He attributed his passion for the arts to his parents and to having grown up in the Boston area, where he had access to many exceptional art museums and venues.Beau Beausoleil is a poet and bookseller living in California. This chapbook is one of his earliest published collections. Published in a run of 300 copies in a famous Brooklyn print shop (The Print Center). Beau is best known now for being a founder of the Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition and the co-editor (along with Deema Shehabi) of the anthology Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here: Poets and Writers Respond to the March 5th, 2007, Bombing of Baghdad’s “Street of the Booksellers”
Merrill Gilfillan
Grand Rapids, MI
(c)2013
More interested in the history of this press than the words on the page with this one. Jen Tynes and crew are on a mission worth keeping track of.
Jennifer Campbell
dancing girl press & studio
Chicago, IL
(c)2021
Fairy tales meets 21st century media culture in this interesting blended collection.
Chelsea Biondolillo
Etchings Press
Indianapolis, IN
(c) 2015
Published in 2015 by the University of Indianapolis' Etching Press, this small collection of prose pieces is unique in size and scope. I didn't know, for example, not that I am worldly wise but I have been to and through Indianapolis, THAT there is a University of Indianapolis. Or that this University has a press. Or that this Press published Ms. Biondolillo. But it's a handsome book to be sure.
Amber Nelson
dancing girl press & studio
Chicago, IL
(c) 2013
I continue to filter through a packet of seconds from this small press. By that I mean books that should have been pulped because they were defective but instead were bundled like dead fish for the unsuspecting boob willing to fork over money for a set of 5 (defective) books.
I wonder how the poems were presented in Reb Livingston's No Tell Motel. They likely were presented better than this stinker. I have no faith in the quality of this press.
Kirsten Kaschock
Bloof Books
(c) 2012
At least for the 2012-2013 season Bloof Books printed a run of 100 numbered chapbooks and then released the text digitally.
The chapbook has a subtitle, actually, which is kind of novel in that most do not. The subtitle is "A Dance with Saints in Three Acts" which corresponds with the cover.
This collection is hand-sewn and has drawings throughout by Koen Kaschock-Marenda. Ms. Kaschock is a multidisciplinary artist who teaches at Drexel University in Philadelphia. The work here skirts the edges of many of those disciplines. It's a beautiful dance.
This is print #39 of 100 made.
Anna Vitale
Perfect Lovers Press
Cincinnati, OH
(c) 2013
The concept is not a new one, really. Poet writing about song tracks of a particular album by a particular band and full disclosure - I got to know the poet who in my estimation has done the best job of this construct is Daniel Nester (whom I know) in his books God Save My Queen (Soft Skull Press, 2003) and God Save My Queen II: The Show Must Go On (Soft Skull, 2004) which covers the entire discography of Queen. Song by song. Essay by essay.
Here - distortion to avoid copyright infringement is hardly worth it. I am more interested in the Xerox series of this unknown (to me) publisher than the work itself.
Buck Downs
self published
Washington, DC
Downs, the Mississippi transplant, the DC rebrand, the poet in the news currently in Washington, DC for his "poetry sticker" project made this hand sewn little chapbook more than a handful of years ago (I suspect). The paper reminds me of early computer paper.
Buck produced a lot of work from the time he landed in DC.
Julia Cohen
dancing girl press
Chicago, IL
(c)2008
Perhaps it's because I just wanted a documentary about post-punk music but I am looking at chapbooks like DIY singles or cassettes. Except that most poets do not produce their own chapbooks and that many publishers are not also poets.
dancing girl press, like a lot of indie record label is bootstrap tight on cash and start up floundering on recognition. This particular chapbook does no favors for the poet or the press (it feels like a copy that should have been pulped instead of added to a packet)
Andrew Schelling
Rocky Ledge Cottage Editions
Boulder, CO
(c) 1991
Andrew Schelling is a well known and established poet and translator who taught at the Naropa University outside of Boulder, CO which explains why "Rocky Ledge Cottage Editions" published this collection. The book was designed by Anne Waldman.
Catherine Daly
limited cycle press
Finland
(c) 2014
Never heard of the press before. The poem in 30 parts is an interesting "projection-analysis" of the world we live in. Frightening and accurate. Good read.
Update: I reached out to Ms. Daly and piece together the following information upgrade. I asked about the piece or pieces in the book and she said, "My original intent was to use this to control steering through texts (ex. jumping). Each section is from a different nintendo game (from about 15 years ago)."
I asked about the publisher (limited cycle press) and learned that it was "Jukka-Pekka Kervinen! I first met him though Peter Ganick @ blue lion, but he'd published some chapbooks of mine (Daly's) online."
Robert Fitterman
Counterpath
Denver, CO
(c) 2016
Full disclosure: I know Robert Fitterman. In fact he was the judge of one of our poetry chapbook contests years ago for Plan B Press, which I run. So when I saw this thin sliver of nothing in a second hand shop, I immediately recognized the name and added it to my stack. After I got the home, I contacted Robert and asked him about this particular venture and he informed me that it was that book is somewhat of a companion piece to No Wait. Yep. Definitely Still Hate Myself published by Ugly Duckling Press in 2014. Not many folks know about I Love Forever, No Matter--that chapbook series with Counterpath never really got off the ground. The chapbook is actually a chapter from a longer unpublished ms. called "The Emotion Wheel"
Buck Downs
self published
Buck Downs is in the news right now in Washington DC for a poetry sticker project that poetry haters are labeling "litter". Sad, really, that people who hate art so are quick to comment on things they don't understand. But it is in the cyber verse that we click in.
Among the items I received from the poetry ephemera "trove" from Iowa were a number of Buck Downs self published poetry chapbook/booklets. This tiny formatted one is the first I will mention. Of course, I choose to mention within context as well. Downs is an outsider, not a DC native, but as so he sees through the hubris that breeds in our nation's capital. Coming as he does, from Mississippi
the fin de siècle poems
Guy Birchard
Pressed Wafer Press
(c) 2003
Rob has written about the man, all I can say is that this thin sliver of nothing is worth the find.
Karen Weiser
Pressed Wafer
Boston, MA
(c)2002
Even with a digital trail sometimes it's best to imagine where the shadow of a poet lingers now. After books published by the likes of Ugly Duckling Presse, a poet like this one can claim a space on the Academy of American Poets website and then not provide any info whatsoever. If you will, a white ghost instead of the traditional black.
What I do know is that this chapbook by the now deceased and discontinued Pressed Wafer is on a table in front of me: half smiling. The booklet is divided into two sections, actually. "Out of the Body there are Planned Things" for Fanny Howe is first, a crash course for those (like me) unfamiliar with Ms. Weiser's work and then the somewhat misleading titled section "8 Positive Trees" taking it's name from a sculpture by Menashe Kadishman. (there are only 7 poems)
I love the brevity of her work here. It's refreshingly deep and subtly so. The words don't have to scream their message, the flow is more of a trickling creek - not the Mississippi River emptying into the Gulf of Mexico.
Theodore S. Boone
National Church Press
Albion, MI
This tiny (and I mean tiny) booklet is a reference booklet listing the accomplishments of Afro-American individuals through history. There were several editions and printings of this booklet. This particular copy has a pink inner page between the cover and the text. Maybe that's how they decided to tell the editions apart (?)
