SWENSEN, Cole
And And And

“Swensen is returning us to a kind of first poetics, a prima poieia, in which word and world are co-creative and mutually flourishing. Here language doesn’t define, doesn’t categorize, doesn’t lay claim to fact or knowledge. What paltry things such certainties are against the ongoing mystery of the vital energy stitching one life to every other…” —Dan Beachy-Quich

Ducks

Watching a duck land on a lake—that amazing way that they glide across just the top millimeter of water. Hearing a duck land on a lake—grazing through your ear at just the same depth. Here the analogy is obvious, except that in the case of a poem, the lake goes on forever, and thus so must the duck.

[book excerpt]

Published by Shearsman Books, 2025
Poetry