NOW AVAILABLE FROM HOT LEAD PRESS
CARL REISMAN'S POETRY IN KETTLE
Kettle: a container, usu. of metal, in which to boil liquids, cook foods, etc.; pot. 2. tea kettle 3. kettle drum 4. kettle hole 5. a gathering of soaring birds, as vultures, using circular updrafts of warm air to gain elevation.
How can a single word share such irreconcilable meanings? Like the collection's namesake, Carl Reisman's poems and David Reisman's drawings in Kettle offer the reader a place for nourishment, music, reflection, and winged flight.
GREEN FIRE CHANGES TO CRYSTAL
Weary of the breed,
every meal
served by an amiable woman.
I wonder, do I really like that food?
Do I like eating from huge pots?Fast for two days
in my felt hat;
maybe then I'll turn a profit
from rabbit warrens.Just another
middle-aged water devotion.
Like my mother and father,
a sedan, a mess,
swerving from side to side.
...............
........
With the immediacy and candid gestures of snapshots, these poems capture
moments in time and place. They seem to demand little of the reader,
and instead take her by the hand, saying, "Look at this!" and "Look at
this!" Sometimes these glimpses into an individual's life grow brighter
and more significant than that one person's story. We read Carl Reisman
for those shining moments. And the line drawings, simple and fresh, are
not so much illustrations as part of a dialogue with the text.
--Julia Kasdorf, author of Eve's Striptease
Plain spoken, guileful and selfless at once, Carl Reisman's
autobiographical exploration of the contours of family and feast belongs
to that rich terrain mapped by William Carlos Williams, "No ideas but in
things." Pocked with native curiosity, Kettle offers a revealing and
generous glimpse into a soul in search of a physical world that has
siphoned off any sense of enemy.
--P. Gregory Springer, editor of 8am.com
Kettle is available from Hot Lead Press, 212 West Green Street, Urbana,
IL, 61801 for $10. To order, please send a check or money order and
include $2.00 for shipping and handling. For more information, please
e-mail the author: creisman61@yahoo.com
