A gripping, eerie, and hilarious novel-in-verse from poet Matthew
Rohrer. In a Russian-doll of fictional episodes, we follow a midlevel
publishing assistant over the course of a day as he encounters ghost
stories, science fiction adventures, Victorian hashish eating, and robot
bigfoots. Rohrer mesmerizes with wildly imaginative tales and resonant
verse in this compelling love letter to storytelling.
this night
they all seemed asleep
for a while the stark shadows
held me
only my mind moved
wildly behind my eyes
until I heard a tiny
song coming from the driver
song of a bandit's broken
heart, song of his betrayal
I slept and dreamed I was awake
Matthew Rohrer is the author of Surrounded by Friends (Wave Books,
2015), Destroyer and Preserver (Wave Books, 2011), A Plate of
Chicken (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2009), Rise Up (Wave Books, 2007) and
A Green Light (Verse Press, 2004), which was shortlisted for the 2005
Griffin Poetry Prize. He is also the author of Satellite (Verse Press,
2001), and co-author, with Joshua Beckman, of Nice Hat. Thanks. (Verse
Press, 2002), and the audio CD Adventures While Preaching the Gospel of
Beauty. He has appeared on NPR's All Things Considered and The Next Big
Thing. His first book, A Hummock in the Malookas was selected for the
National Poetry Series by Mary Oliver in 1994. He lives in Brooklyn, New
York, and teaches at NYU.
