Part of my motivation with KSE is to champion the work of poets whose work I believe in and who deserve a wider audience, and also to gently prod these poets into doing some longer-form and/or conceptual works that they might not have done in the working poet’s usual quest for placement of poems one-at-a-time in magazines or on literary websites. By doing that, we are helping to create an important body of work that these poets can include in later and better-distributed “Selected Poems”-type collections. I’ve always viewed the KSE chapbooks as the equivalent of playing AA or AAA-level minor league baseball, building up a good record and raising your game to the highest level, and then stepping up to the majors…READY. Or opening your play in Hartford before taking it to New York.
Misti Rainwater-Lites, the real poet laureate of Texas IMHO, reminds me of some of the original 77′-era punk bands in that she burst on the scene with work of incredible energy and anger and focus and jagged detail, and then she gradually refined her art, incorporating a broader range of influences, working in greater subtlety and nuance, and really developing her art. Think Wire, or The Jam, or John Lydon-Rotten, or The Damned. From “Anarchy in the UK” to Flowers of Romance. Misti’s first chap for KSE was her pairing with Doug Draime on Next Exit: Three. Her gift for Texas-specific detail and for capturing the texture of Texas life, but in a way that resonates internationally, is unmatched, and her Texas poems in NE3 were gems. Whenever I’m in smalltown Texas, I often turn to Mary Anne and say, “wow, I feel like I’m living in one of Misti’s poems!” Her next chapbook was the beautiful sequence LULLABIES FOR JACKSON, a group of 8 poems addressed to her at-the-time-not-yet-born child Jackson. This showed the great range and mastery of tone that Misti possesses and was released to rave reviews. It’s long out of print, but our friends at Orange Alert have a few copies remaining in the OA Store, so if you missed getting a copy while it was available, go to http://www.orangealert.bigcartel.com/product/lullabies-for-jackson-by-misti-rainwater-lites and act now. Misti’s 3rd chap for KSE was the solo NEXT EXIT: TEN, the final entry in our ten-volume NE series. While this got some fine notices and sold well, I don’t think it’s yet received the attention it’s due It’s still available, by the way, so why not order it along with Misti’s new one ODD YEARS.
And speaking of ODD YEARS…this new chap grew out of Misti’s reading of authors such as James Tate and Jean Cocteau. It’s a series of 15 poems set in different odd years, ranging from 1945 to 3003 (!!!), and finds Misti moving into somewhat surrealist-absurdist vein, but hey, life in Texas IS surreal and absurd, and Misti plays it close to the vest only exaggerating reality a little bit, but enough to make her point. Ever seen, say, John Waters’s SERIAL MOM? Every poem is different, there are a number of voices being channelled, and what we get is a kind of smorgasbord of the ridiculously real. I love it! Want a taste?
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2001
Nothing has changed. Nothing will change.
At the end of that road you will still find mud puddles
decorated with used condoms and cigarette butts.
The planes fly above our shacks
and we sit on the stoops blowing bubbles
for our kids
wishing escape
was that
easy for us.
Cars complain down the road.
Music spills out.
Never the New York Dolls or Nina Simone.
Nothing we could dance to.
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ODD YEARS by Misti Rainwater-Lites, KSE #130. Taste the garlic mashed potatoes. Investigate the nude psychic readings. Enter a friend in the Burt Reynolds look-alike contest. Forget your warts and play the piano!!!
Cost is $4.00 each or 3 for $10.00 (only one copy of any book per customer) postpaid in North America. Send a check (or well-concealed cash) made payable to Bill Shute, 14080 Nacogdoches Rd. #350, San Antonio, Texas, 78247. OR chapbooks are available to overseas readers DIRECT FROM KSE postpaid outside of North America for only $5 each. Overseas orders should write and request a paypal invoice for whatever you’d like.
Why not get the 3-for-10 deal and choose NEXT EXIT: TEN as your second book. Here’s what’s available now from KSE:
#132, DOUG DRAIME, knox county ;
#135, BILL SHUTE, stereo action (sound library series, volume 42) ;
#130, MISTI RAINWATER-LITES, odd years ;
#126, MICHAEL LAYNE HEATH, grey rage (dyed) ;
#127, BRAD KOHLER, dog nights, dog days ;
#133, BILL SHUTE, this day without (sound library series, volume 41) ;
#131, BILL SHUTE, acres (sound library series, volume 40) ;
#129, MIRA HORVICH / BILL SHUTE, suspension ;
#119, A. J. KAUFMANN, satori in berlin (x-berg songs) ;
#122, LUIS CUAUHTEMOC BERRIOZABAL, still human.
Fortunately for us, Misti will be back in the Fall of 2009 with a new and original creation written especially for KSE, an ode to Las Vegas called VEGAS THE HARD WAY. It will be an excellent complement to Diane Wakoski’s classic THE EMERALD CITY OF LAS VEGAS, published by Black Sparrow Press, which everyone should read immediately. Actually, anything by Ms. Wakoski is worth tracking down. She has long been one of my favorite American poets, and Misti and I and so many other working poets are in her debt. ODD YEARS is a hand-numbered, hand-assembled edition of 74 copies, and I’ve already distributed about 35 of them, so act soon…
