Archive - September 8, 2010

Mosquito Operas: New and Selected Short Poems Philip Dacey (Nigeria 1963–65) New York: Rain Mountain Press July 2010 73 pages $10.00 Reviewed by Sandra Meek (Botswana 1989–91) PHILIP DACEY’S MOST RECENT BOOK is an unusual one for the world of contemporary American poetry; rather than being organized by thematic arc or by the chronology of their writing, these poems are brought together because of one shared formal trait: simply, they are all short. In his author’s note that begins the collection, Dacey describes the book as “a kind of family reunion,” noting the earliest of these poems dates back to 1970. From the very first page of poems, this book does exhibit a wild diversity of both subject matter and tone not unlike an extended family gathering where, say, an angst-ridden teenage boy in black eyeliner and fingernail polish might be forced into the buffet line next to his back-slapping, . . .

Jason Boog is an editor at mediabistro.com’s publishing Web site, GalleyCat (www.mediabistro.com/galleycat). His work has appeared in The Believer, Granta, Salon.com, The Revealer, and Peace Corps Writers, and he is a contributor to the Poetry Foundation’s  poetryfoundation.org. This piece appeared in the December 15, 2009, issue of Wabash College’s on-line magazine. Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Indiana is a small and very good liberal arts college for men. This article by Jason is one in a series of ongoing conversations about what it means to be a man in the 21st Century. • A Man’s Life: Sad Men by Jason Boog (Guatemala 2000-02) I lost my job in December 2008, unemployed at the beginning of the longest, coldest winter I can remember in New York City. Up until then, everything had been going swimmingly: I was a staff writer at an investigative reporting publication, taught an undergraduate journalism class, and proposed to my girlfriend . . .