Some Chapbooks
What I've Been Reading # 1
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Last summer, I spent a night at the poet Zachary Bond’s apartment in Somerville, MA. I met Zack while we were in grad school, and he’s always been a writer that I admire because he feels several steps ahead of me.
When my stay ended, he sent me off with a copy of his chapbook Money Poems, published by his own Second Scalpel press. I have no idea how many copies he’s printed, and I’m sure the only way to get a copy is from him directly. And this chap makes me giddy thinking about all the stellar work that’s circulating in beautiful small ways, among friends, the incredible poems that most of us will never get a chance to read.
In one of my favorites, “New Money Proverbs,” he remixes aphorisms, a classic Lloyd Schwartz-ian move, in a way that seems so simple but I know (from trying) takes a wit and skill that many poets simply don’t have. I want wild success for Zack, but I also get a huge smile when I think of someone stumbling across this chapbook years from now and obsessing over it.
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I was thrilled when I saw Dead Mall Press was putting out a chapbook by Isaac Pickell. Dead Mall does fantastic work, and Isaac is a poet who I respect so wildly. Over on Bluesky, he was often drafting and posting a new poem every single day (though either my memory is bad or he’s taken some down, hopefully because they’ll be in his next book). There’s a rigor to his work that’s so immediate, both in the language and the ideas he’s working through.
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Also last summer, the poet Reid Kurkewicz, who I’d only met once at a wedding and I believe was my wife’s homecoming date, helped me organize a reading in Brooklyn at Unnamable Books. Similarly, Reid sent me off with a copy of his chapbook, Man of the Law, published in 2023 by SLAB editions.
These poems have a thrilling wit and humor to them, but also a sense of dissatisfaction and critique at the center of every move: “Even then I knew sentimentality was a bad sign”, “How many tax dollars does a poem deserve?”. A real delight to chew on these.
