Logorrhea Dementia

by Dargan, Kyle

• ISBN13: 9780820336848
• ISBN10: 082033684X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-09-01
• Publisher: Univ of Georgia Pr

Summary

Attempting to stitch a quilt of language for the new millennium, Kyle G. Dargan finds himself in his third collection propelled forward by a meacute;lange of voices-individuals passed on the street, journalists, philosophers, movie and cartoon characters, hip-hop emcees, and fellow poets-all of which build to a self-diagnosed logorrhea dementia. Darganrs"s voice channels an America mentally fatigued from a decade of foreign conflict yet cautiously hopeful about the promise of the countryrs"s renewed introspection. In these poems, rife with the anxieties of the aughts, Dargan seeks to destabilize social and cultural landscapes believed to be settled-breaking and clearing ground to lay the foundation for a new American perspective.

Author Biography

Kyle G. Dargan’s previous collection of poems Bouquet of Hungers received the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and his debut collection, The Listening, was the winner of the Cave Canem Poetry Prize. He is the former managing editor of Callaloo and the founder and current editor of POST NO ILLS magazine. He is an assistant professor of literature and creative writing at American University in Washington, D.C.

Excerpts

“Entropy”
What if our alphabet was full
of atoms :: I would speak in moles—
spill more in my sleep than a drunk
criers’ convention :: Hear Ye,
I could not be silent :: Silence translates
into all things and nothings
like the atom in fission
labs—atomic models braced
on wooden bones :: If atoms
left fossils, they would be etchings,
an ornate script illegible
across all our faces—