We laughed. They had to be kidding, but this was liberation--
we were breathing, ah down a neck, o in an eyelid, uh on a belly.

Her playfulness and the concreteness of her words in some of her more structured poems remind me a little of late Lisa Jarnot. But most of her poems are looser, and she also reminds me a little of Noelle Kocot, though she doesn't follow the endless folds of metaphor into oblivion the way Kocot does.

Or maybe she's just herself. Very strange but fun poems. Somehow I can get behind this kind of nonsense, whereas most poems in this vein I usually hate. She's loose but she's tight where she needs to be tight, and then she let's it all hang out. Her poems are very evocative of place and setting and narrative, though the narrative is then subtracted, and nothing is stated explicitly, and the most important words are substituted with something akin.

These days Woody propagandas me under the sheets:
We are never better than the Workers!

There are no Workers left, I'd answer,
but his sickle is hard against my knee.

What are these poems? They are hip and fast but not in an annoying way, not like some I've read. They are actually not as hip and fast as they first appear. Something about them is a slow personal vocabulary of superstitions obsessions thoughtfulness and intimate meanings. There's almost always something I see in these poems beyond 'cool words' or 'nice sounds'. There's a lot going on in here, past the surface.

At the same time, these poems are about nothing as well.

Though "Nothing, too, is a subject".

You stand for NOTHING but melody. And above metal melody, you have built a bank melody, and by that you WILL NOT be lyres.

Check out her website and her blog and book reviews.

Also, read this essay she wrote on feminism and other political subjects, which pretty much sums up why she's so awesome. "I want an avant-garde of light forearm touching." Exactly. ( )