"[Mary] Ruefle . . . brings us an often unnerving, but always fresh
and exhilarating view of our common experience of the world."--Charles
Simic
Fans of Lydia Davis and Miranda July will delight in this short prose
from a beloved and cutting-edge poet. Here are thirty stories that
deliver the soft touch and the sucker punch with stunning aplomb. Ducks,
physicists, detectives, and The New York Times all make appearances.
From "The Dart and the Drill"
I do not believe that when my brother pierced my skull with a
succession of darts thrown from across our paneled rec room on the night
of November 18th in my sixth year on earth, he was trying to transcend
the notions of time and space as contained and protected by the human
skull. But who can fathom the complexities of the human brain? Ten years
later--this would have been in 1967--the New York Times reported a
twenty-four year old man, who held an honor degree in law, died in the
process of using a dentist's drill on his own skull, positioned an inch
above his right ear, in an attempt to prove that time and space could be
conquered . . .
Mary Ruefle's poems and prose have appeared in Harper's Magazine,
The Best American Poetry, and The Next American Essay. Her many
awards include NEA and Guggenheim fellowships. She is a frequent
visiting professor at the University of Iowa, and she lives and teaches
in Vermont.
