Recommended Summer Reading - Eileen Tabios

During the month of June, No Tells is featuring "Recommended Summer Reading" selections by No Tell contributors.


Eileen Tabios' recommendations:

So far this year, I've read 280 poetry publications. I usually—and deliberately—make reading choices at random (except for books I’m obliged to read when judging a poetry contest, as I did this year for the SFSU Poetry Center Prize). But from such reading, I recommend the following, e.g. for "summer reading."

The Collected Poems Of Barbara Guest, Ed. Hadley Haden Guest (Wesleyan University Press)
Which I recently chose as the winner of The Poetry Center Prize.

Had Slaves by Catherine Sasanov (Firewheel Editions)
Outstanding! Not only has my highest recommendation but my deepest Respect!

Juvenilia by Ken Chen (Yale University Press)
Far far above the typical poet's first book. Admirably -- and effectively -- ambitious. Sophisticated. Will make you fall in love

The World In A Minute by Gary Lenhart (Hanging Loose Press)
The authenticity is impressively due to the seamlessness between the social and the personal.

Praying To The Black Cat by Henry Israeli (Del Sol Press)
There's a poem in there, "Creation Myth Number One", that has one of the most powerful beginnings I can remember reading in a poem...

Bending The Mind Around The Dream's Blown Fuse by Timothy Liu (Talismans House)
Simply: Magnificent!

The Trees Around by Chris Tonelli (Birds, LLC)
Marvelous nuances--they seduce with their subtlety.

Occultations by David Wolach (Black Radish Books)
Powerful and moving.

The War Works Hard by Dunya Mikhail (New Directions Press)
Some of the most compelling “war poems” or political poems I’ve read from contemporary poets.

A Musics by Carrie Hunter (Arrow As Arrow)
Wonderful wander-full wanting.

Destruction Myth by Mathias Svalina (Cleveland State University Press)
Svalina is offering among the most stick-to-Memory reads in my deliberately-random poetry readings.

Easy Eden, collaborative poems by Micah Ballard and James Patrick Dunagan (Push)
Luminous and wise gems. A ravishingly glorious read.

Diary Of A Wave Outside The Sea by Dunya Mikhail, trans. From the Arabic by Elizabeth Winslow and Dunya Mikhail (New Directions Press)
Interesting.

Undocumentaries by Rosa Alcalá (Shearsman)
Intelligent social poems with welcome verbal flourishes; nice to see these poems by an author I first knew as a translator.

The French Exit by Elisa Gabbert (Birds, LLC)
Many exquisite gems.

Much Like You Shark by Logan Ryan Smith (Dusie)
Very clever music from a fallen angel.

Genji Monogatari by Mark Young (Otoliths)
Freshly clever and musical take on intertextual reading.

Ntst: The Collected Pwoermds Of Geof Huth (if p then q)
Ffreshly rolicking read.

Letters To An Albatross by Anita Mohan (BlazeVOX Books)
S freshly auspicious debut.

I Was The Jukebox by Sandra Beasley (W.W. Norton)
The muscular confidence underlying these poems are a fresh antidote to the more common self-deprecation found in contemporary poems.

The House Of Mae Rim / La Casa De Mae Rim by Mariano Zaro (Carayan Press)
Beautifully spare.

After Rimbaud's Illuminations by David-Baptiste Chirot (tir aux pigeons)
Beautifully resonant.

Submissions by Jared Schickling (BlazeVOX Books)
Beautifully intriguing.

Texture Notes by Sawako Nakayasu (Letter Machine Editions)
Intelligent luminosities!

The Importance Of Peeling Potatoes In The Ukraine by Mark Yakich (Penguin)
So good it made me immediately go to order his other book.

Ashes Gifted, poems and painting reproductions by Joshua Abelow (Sacrifice Press)
A witty and funny self-awareness.

Another America / Otra America by Barbara Kingsolver, with translations by Rebeca Cartes (Seal Press)
Surprisingly captivating.

God Damsel by Reb Livingston (No Tell Books)
A welcome, and all-too-rare sophistication in its poetic approach.

Cooking With Organizational Structures by Francis Raven (Moria Poetry)
Witty and smart.

Mondo Crampo by Juliet Cook (Dusie)
Nice harmony in concept and design that supports text.

No Choice But To Follow by Jean Yamasaki Toyama, Juliet S. Kono, Ann Inoshita and Christy Passion (Bamboo Ridge Press)
A project where the sum is greater than its parts--befitting how these poems were written to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the wonderful Bamboo Ridge! And speaking of poet-discoveries (or at least poets new to me), this Christy Passion's poetics and poems are wonderful!

The Black Automaton by Douglas Kearney (Fence Books)
Loved this wonderful wonderful collection with its fabulous energy!

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Eileen Tabios' most recent book is THE THORN ROSARY: Selected Prose Poems and New 1998-2010 (Marsh Hawk Press). She edits the most fun poetry review journal online, Galatea Resurrects.