Blitzkrieg

by John Gosslee

Poetry. Art. John Gosslee's second book, BLITZKRIEG , covers a lot of territory, literally, from the Atlantic Ocean across the United States to the Pacific Ocean in prose and just as much ground figuratively in the 13-poem sequence that begins the book. BLITZKRIEG begins as a 13-poem sequence that progresses through a number of cities, symbolic locales and hauntingly provocative metaphors. The non-narrative style of the sequence was inspired by the life-changing poem "Portrait of an Inner Life." Introduced by a four panel illustration of "Portrait of an Inner Life" by cartoonist Yumi Sakugawa, the third chapter features 25 pictures of the poem posted by street teams in Chicago, Los Angeles, Pheonix, Charlotte, New York and other cities. Photographs of the poem in a bottle taken by Brandon McCrea and three full size paintings of the poem by artist Scott Kirschner demonstrate how fine artists visualize the poem.

Genres: Poetry

57 pages, Paperback

First published September 29, 2013

About the author

John Gosslee edits Fjords Review and directs C&R Press. He directed [PANK] from 2015-18 and launched [PANK] Books. His poetry appears in Yale Review, Poetry Ireland, Southampton Review, Gulf Coast, and many other magazines and journals.
johngosslee.com

Reviews

[Christina M M Rau · Rating 3 out of 5]

I reviewed this book in full for Gently Read Literature. Here's a micro-version:Poetry is art. Art is life. Poetry is life. All art one art. This syllogism applies to John Gosslee’s Blitzkrieg, a multi-media cross-genre collection in three parts. “Blitzkrieg,” defined in the very first pages as “a surprise artistic assault by massed electronic, air, sea and ground forces under close coordination,” describes the makeup of the book and more specifically the first part, a short stream of poems woven together with anaphora, liturgy, diction, assonance, alliteration, and motif. After the first part, the focus moves to one poem, described and explained in a prose piece, and ends in an array of visuals. Right in the middle of all these words and images, Page 17 directs us to “LISTEN AND WATCH composer Taras Mashtalir’s musical score and filmmaker Roberta Hall’s adaptation on BLITZKRIEGHQ.com. This website acts as the hub for all the creativity and artistic innovations that make up this collection. Blitzkrieg intrigues because it is not your average poetry collection. Instead of offering only words on a page, it bombards with words, images, and calls for participation. It can be overwhelming and frenetic, and the poetry, at times, lacks newness or a sense of being completed. However, the overall goal, to show that poetry is more than a simple poem, clearly emerges, making this reading, viewing, and living of poetry worthwhile.