Absurdity, woe is me, glory be : one hundred poems hovering between the absurd and the existential / J.J. Steinfeld.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Steinfeld, J. J., author.

Series:

Essential poets ; 241.

Essential poets series ; 241

Standardized Title:

Poems. Selections

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Canadian poetry--21st century.

Canadian poetry.

Genre:

Poetry.

Physical Description:

xi, 131 pages ; 23 cm.

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Toronto ; Buffalo ; Lancaster, U.K. : Guernica Editions, 2017.

Summary:

The 100 wide-ranging and idiosyncratic poems of Absurdity, Woe Is Me, Glory Be confront, grapple with, explore, argue with, and ultimately embrace the human condition as they wend their way through the worldly and the otherworldly aspects of absurdity and existence, the ordinary and the extraordinary spheres of being. They are an attempt to make sense out of senselessness. Book jacket.

Contents:

Sisyphus Requests His Rock Returned 1

Rebirth 2

A Morning, an Afternoon, a Night of Questions 3

It Isn't Relevant 4

Placards 5

Elusive as to Logic and Identifiable Place 6

When Yon First Attempt to Explain Your Existence 8

More Questions Than Stars in the Questioning Sky 10

You Have Lost Track 12

Late-in-Life Escape 14

Insect Smile 15

The Bees and the Flowers Turn on Me 16

The Metaphysics of Seashells 18

The Unnatural History of Scars and Flowers 19

Hold Your Humans 20

A Not So Absurd Survey 21

The Long and Short of Absurdity 22

As You Go To and Fro 23

Where Those Who Have Made Vows of Silence Gather 24

Escape Words 25

Headlong 26

Images Becoming Soundlike 27

The Price of a Poem 28

At the Conjurer's Book Launch 29

Is the Forgotten Poet Sad or Disconsolate? 30

In Erudition and Befuddlement 31

Foretelling 33

Metaphor-Eating 34

Past and Future Words 35

Life and Art, Somewhat 36

Interruptions 37

Spiritual Therapy 38

A Theory of Education 39

Worshipping 40

Congratulations 41

Watching the Audience 42

Testimony 43

What Would It Mean? 44

As Tasty as Madness 45

Oddment 46

Spare Change and a Few Poetic Words 47

I Like These Little Talks We Have 48

A Disenchanted Existentialist's Education 49

The Word Monstrosity 50

At Another's Latest Exhibition 51

A Sad, Mistaken Pay 52

Worldly Discussion 53

The Memory of Youthful Swiftness 54

The Ill-Gotten Gains of Madness and Eternity 55

Ten Exotic Ports of Call 57

Even If It Is Godot 59

Failed Transaction 60

The Liquid of Expectation 61

Handwritten Love Letters 62

Lonely Metaphors 63

La Petite Mort Sounds So Sexy, Existential 64

Dressing and Undressing the Dream Poet 65

The Coinage of Love 66

A Love Poem's Conclusion 67

Murder Mystery 68

Costume Party 69

Guest Speaker 71

Your Pencil Shaking Like a Tree Branch in a Movie Storm 72

With Exactness and Precision and Beauty 73

Hidden Away in the Dark 74

It Is Not an Intriguing Day / Whose Fault Is That? 75

Something More 77

A Lifetime's Lost and Found 78

Over Vast Chasms 79

Prowling 81

Approaching the Autobiographical 82

In This Little Room with All the Lights On 83

Misplacement 84

Existential Business Dealings 86

What Do You Have to Say for Yourself? Ten Times Over 87

Distant from Everything 89

Waiting for a Reply 90

This Elaborate Plan 92

A Cauldron the Size of Half the Earth 93

One Day I Am Going to ... 94

Will This Be ...? 95

My First and Last Existential Magic Trick 96

Wordful and Wordless 97

The Shadow-Thinker and the Sleep-Walker 99

On Meeting a Goth Androgyne in a Dark Downtown Bar 100

Ardour Everlasting and Companionship Eternal 102

After the Ardour 104

They Didn't Exactly Fall in Love 105

Have You Any News for Me? 107

Unwilling to Turn Around 108

A Month of Absurd Sundays 109

Existential Gunfire 111

The Out-of-Work Poet's Still Abundant Hair 113

Regardless of Weather or Disintegrating Dreams 115

Wearing a Map of Scars 116

The Sad Bureaucrat When the World Ends 117

Ending Music of the Disoriented Soul 119

Cosmic Joking 121

Unfulfilled 123

Absurdity, Woe Is Me, Glory Be 125.

ISBN:

9781771831925

1771831928

OCLC:

972181814