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Human Scale
"It would be difficult for me to overstate my admiration for Michael Kelleher's new poems. They vibrate to a music rarely heard before, combining passion and intelligence with such mastery that one is left stunned by the pleasure they afford. With few words, an entire world is born. -- Paul Auster Lyric in its intensity, Michael Kelleher's Human Scale reveals by way of its commitment to the poetic fragment both the measure and the song of this human, all too human world. Tuned open and emotionally pitched, his insistent music reminds us, thankfully, that we're not alone in "reckless silence." --Peter Gizzi"
94 pages, Paperback
First published August 27, 2007
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May 16, 2008
"Of all the things he was seeing
Would he come to see the sun
As source of hours of days of years
Would he feel compelled to return to the cave
Compelled to tell the others what he'd seen
Would he find the others would not
Would he find the others could and would not
Ever believe him and would they not
Say he was a fool and would they not
Say he'd been burned and would this not
Be a cause for laughter and would he not
Insist the others stand and turn their necks
To see the things he'd seen and would they not
Insist on the evidence of his senses...."
--from the poem "A PASSING SHADOW" in the book
The book grapples with the design of our will for the imagined world in new ways. This excerpt above is not how much of the book sings, as much of it is spare, few, lines. But I LOVE "A PASSING SHADOW" for its INSISTENT ring of circumstance that can come to surround much of what is problematic with human scale. Meaning human scale, what the book looks at, not the book itself I mean, of course. But "A PASSING SHADOW" is like a dream that has no end, no matter how technology "advances" the human scale of world.
My favorite section is the sequence "NACHTMUSIK"
"As if by design
A message of air
Water, light, earth
& stars I must
School I know not
Where to learn
To read these
Beautiful warnings."
And about the book itself, it's a beautiful little book, fits in one hand, making the HUMAN SCALE of the human scale a little brighter for a glance. Inside there are images in black and white, stark refrains for the words themselves. It's sharp in every way. Although the table of contents does not match the actual poems, but that's something I kind of like to be honest. It was funny at first, then I liked that it was funny.
CAConrad
http://CAConrad.blogspot.com
....
Would he come to see the sun
As source of hours of days of years
Would he feel compelled to return to the cave
Compelled to tell the others what he'd seen
Would he find the others would not
Would he find the others could and would not
Ever believe him and would they not
Say he was a fool and would they not
Say he'd been burned and would this not
Be a cause for laughter and would he not
Insist the others stand and turn their necks
To see the things he'd seen and would they not
Insist on the evidence of his senses...."
--from the poem "A PASSING SHADOW" in the book
The book grapples with the design of our will for the imagined world in new ways. This excerpt above is not how much of the book sings, as much of it is spare, few, lines. But I LOVE "A PASSING SHADOW" for its INSISTENT ring of circumstance that can come to surround much of what is problematic with human scale. Meaning human scale, what the book looks at, not the book itself I mean, of course. But "A PASSING SHADOW" is like a dream that has no end, no matter how technology "advances" the human scale of world.
My favorite section is the sequence "NACHTMUSIK"
"As if by design
A message of air
Water, light, earth
& stars I must
School I know not
Where to learn
To read these
Beautiful warnings."
And about the book itself, it's a beautiful little book, fits in one hand, making the HUMAN SCALE of the human scale a little brighter for a glance. Inside there are images in black and white, stark refrains for the words themselves. It's sharp in every way. Although the table of contents does not match the actual poems, but that's something I kind of like to be honest. It was funny at first, then I liked that it was funny.
CAConrad
http://CAConrad.blogspot.com
....
Displaying 1 of 1 review