In 1993, I was digging into my new living space, making new friends and alliances and doing a lot of puppet performances. It was a good year for me. Things were flowing. I'm sure this was the year I spent nearly a month in New York City, on three separate trips.
Number 2 is an bonus Dedications Issue. HELP! is in memory of Harvey Kurtzman, cartoonist and magazine editor. Things to Come is for Dizzy Gillespie jazz trumpeter, bandleader, singer, and composer. Impossible Hopes is for "those who've cruelly died--too soon, too sad." Dizzy was the greatest! I admired Harvey Kurtzman, and got to meet him once. There is also a poem Off Notes for the jazz singer Billie Holiday in Number 1.
Number 3 has the inevitable disclaimer, noting that my poetry may be a bit stronger and more intense than most. Then in Number 10: thoughts upon turning 40. It's more on my thoughts dealing with "the great all" than any specifics of my aging.
In Number 2's SURREAL THEATRE, the characters break the bounds of the panels, trying to escape off the page. In Number 3, the comics are in pencil instead of pen "a human face to displace disgrace." In Number 5, I start a new story line with the "eccentric observer" spying on various odd scenes around Poptown. These are numbered one through seventeen in this volume. The scenes include people lounging in bed, working, washing their animals, swimming, grooving on old jazz records, etc.
In Number 7 Beneath the Underground is connected with my big solo art exhibition at downtown Detroit's Space Gallery. Number 9's 7th annual Emotional Digest issue includes anxiety, guilt, and Horror. It's not too cheery this time.
Number 11's the 7th annual Dedications Issue. For Muddy Waters, a great bluesman, I wrote neartear. I wrote a very short poem for Yves Tanguy, surrealist painter of wild forms and light, both aquatic and earth-bitten. For Saint-John Perse, great French poet, I wrote the feathered poles. For Leonora Carrington, the wonderful surrealist painter and storyteller, I wrote the shadow wolf.
Personal Favorites: Number 1's Real Life still reminds me that life is amazing and not to be taken for granted. The "headline collage" poem in Number 4 still gets to me. And, I really like the "Dedications" poems.
SURREAL THEATRE favorites include Numbers 7, 8, 9 and 10.