Friday, April 16, 2010

Our very own Colin Cheney's first-ever book launch, plus Kimiko Hahn's book launch, April 29 at 8 pm.

Please join us on Thursday, April 29th for a creature double feature: the book launch for Colin Cheney's HERE BE MONSTERS and Kimiko Hahn's TOXIC FLORA. The poets will be reading from their new collections, and signing copies of their books. Introductions by R.A. Villanueva.

“Kimiko Hahn stands as a welcome voice of experimentation and passion.”—Bloomsbury Review. For Kimiko Hahn, the language and imagery of science open up magical possibilities for the poet. Inspired by articles from the weekly “Science Times” section of the New York Times, Hahn explores identity, extinction, and survival. With these elegant, ardent poems, Hahn reaffirms her position as an artist of both “daring lyricism” (Eavan Boland) and “rigorous intelligence” (Mark Doty). Kimiko Hahn is the author of several books of poetry, including THE NARROW ROAD TO THE INTERIOR, THE ARTIST'S DAUGHTER, MOSQUITO AND ANT. Her many honors include the American Book Award. She lives in New York City.

"A beautifully balanced concoction—now simple and direct, now oblique and complex—of careful science, remote lore, and immediate feeling, all conjuring an atmosphere of skeptical wonder that the poet shares with us."—Eamon Grennan. Pollination and endangerment loom large in HERE BE MONSTERS, as do the binaries of creation and destruction. In his poems Cheney explores the various types of damage with which humans are so closely entwined, including our encroachment on nature, our propensity to give in to our worst impulses, and the havoc that our cells can wreak on our own bodies—"the extraordinary touches the ordinary, and something changes in us” (Yusef Komunyakaa). Winner of the National Poetry Series, HERE BE MONSTERS is Cheney's debut collection. (http://www.colincheney.com)