A Mayse-Bikhl: Poetry by Sonya Taaffe
Presenting A Mayse-Bikhl, Jewish-themed mostly-speculative poetry by Sonya Taaffe (sovay), in her first collection in some time; with a brilliant introduction by Me, and conjured into chapbook form by Erzebet YellowBoy Carr of the exquisite Papaveria Press. If you've never owned one of Papaveria's amazing editions, please consider this one! They are masterpieces of papercraft in the old style, lovely to look at and hold.
I will paste my introduction which was written by me here, so as to give you a better idea of the particular golden peacock you will be purchasing:
“Here are almost a decade’s worth of poems, curated by the author and Rose Lemberg. They tap an abiding cultural well; they are folk tales, mermaid-mayses, they are the richly hued wares of those who have traded in small, bright, enduring objects for a thousand years. Ms. Taaffe knows how to please the reading eye and linger in the senses, to charm by a sound, to sketch an inheritance with ash and fire and with sweetness. By turns intimate, elegiac, singing, and seeking, these poems are full of truth. They are deeply and completely Jewish poems, though to say that is to reach above one’s height for the emet written in the clay. Perhaps all Jewish texts look backward, inward, into dreams and the dark: better the wolf you know. These are poems for those who have known the wolf. Memory, wire-sharp and gallows-cold, is here, and the last notes of songs the whole world has forgotten. Orpheus is here too, Amazons, tzaddikim, dybbukim, small gods, and tummlers; the weighted grey of the diaspora; the warm golden stones of Jerusalem. It is all yours for the taking.”
- Selkie
The title is available for purchase next week on Papaveria Press' website. I am very pleased.
I will paste my introduction which was written by me here, so as to give you a better idea of the particular golden peacock you will be purchasing:
“Here are almost a decade’s worth of poems, curated by the author and Rose Lemberg. They tap an abiding cultural well; they are folk tales, mermaid-mayses, they are the richly hued wares of those who have traded in small, bright, enduring objects for a thousand years. Ms. Taaffe knows how to please the reading eye and linger in the senses, to charm by a sound, to sketch an inheritance with ash and fire and with sweetness. By turns intimate, elegiac, singing, and seeking, these poems are full of truth. They are deeply and completely Jewish poems, though to say that is to reach above one’s height for the emet written in the clay. Perhaps all Jewish texts look backward, inward, into dreams and the dark: better the wolf you know. These are poems for those who have known the wolf. Memory, wire-sharp and gallows-cold, is here, and the last notes of songs the whole world has forgotten. Orpheus is here too, Amazons, tzaddikim, dybbukim, small gods, and tummlers; the weighted grey of the diaspora; the warm golden stones of Jerusalem. It is all yours for the taking.”
- Selkie
The title is available for purchase next week on Papaveria Press' website. I am very pleased.