Mezzanines

by Matthew Olzmann

Overview

"There’s something inherently spiritual about Olzmann’s Mezzanines. . . . It’s a place of reflection and contemplation, a temporary reprieve from the world’s chaos and a reach for a vision of paradise." —The Los Angeles Review of Books

“. . .the poems [in Mezzanines] have doors that open and invite you inside. The rooms of the house may be odd, and the stairwells may lead in strange directions, but you, as the reader, remain beckoned. [Olzmann] hasn’t invited you in just to leave you. He’s got stories to tell, and they’re good.” —The Huffington Post Blog

There is no place Matthew Olzmann doesn’t visit in his poignant debut. From underwater to outer space, Mezzanines is a contained universe, constantly shifting through multiple perceptions of the surreal and the real. A lyrical conversation with mortality, Olzmann explores identity, faith, and our sense of place, with an acute awareness of our minute existence.

From "NASA Video Transmission Picked Up By Baby Monitor":

How many shadows are there left to name?
Logophobia is the fear of words. Keraunothnetophobia
is the fear of falling man-made satellites.
Imagine this last one:
you walk outside and look to heaven
expecting a sky lab plunging down on you—wires
everywhere, bolts loosening, metal body in flames.
Instead, you see only blue, endless blue,
the color of a baby’s new blanket, cloaking everything.

Matthew Olzmann is a graduate of the MFA program for writers at Warren Wilson College. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Kenyon Review, New England Review, Inch, Gulf Coast, Rattle, and elsewhere. He’s received fellowships from Kundiman and the Kresge Arts Foundation. Currently, he is a writer-in-residence for the InsideOut Literary Arts Project and the poetry editor of The Collagist.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781882295982
Publisher:	Alice James Books
Publication date:	04/16/2013
Pages:	80
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.10(d)

About the Author

Author: Matthew Olzmann is a graduate of the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Kenyon Review, New England Review, Inch, Gulf Coast, Rattle and elsewhere. He’s received fellowships from Kundiman and the Kresge Arts Foundation. Currently, he is a writer-in-residence for the InsideOut Litereary Arts Project and the poetry editor of The Collagist.

Table of Contents

NASA Video Transmission Picked Up by Baby Monitor 1

Hello Earth, 2

The Tiny Men in the Horse's Mouth 3

Spock as a Metaphor for the Construction of Race During My Childhood 5

Planetarium with Deformed Elephants 7

Bigfoot and the Placebo Effect 8

Shipwrecks of the Great Lakes 9

The Hand That Taps the Names into Gravestones 11

93,000,000 Miles from the Sun 12

The Melting Pot in Housewares Has a Slight Crack 13

Mountain Dew Commercial Disguised as a Love Poem 15

Was Blind, But Now 16

Torque 17

Art of the Mime: An Educational Camp for Children 18

Snake Charming 19

The Rug 20

The Witness Garden 21

Alternate Sources of Fuel 22

Notes Regarding Happiness 23

Sir Isaac Newton's First Law of Motion 26

Revisions 27

The Man Who Looks Lost as He Stands in the Sympathy Card Section of Hallmark 28

The Antiquary 29

Dead Beetles Stuffed with Cocaine 30

The Days 31

Man Robs Liquor Store, Leaves Résumé 32

How Much 33

While Scratching My Wife's Back, I Calculate the Distance Between Sky and Earth 34

Rabbits 35

When He Weighs Only His Right Foot 37

Gas Station on Second Street, Detroit 38

Photograph of a Bay and a Dead Dog 39

A River, Briefly Parallel to an Eight-Lane Super Highway 40

Small Resurrection 41

Previous Theories on the Body 42

Protocol of Angels 44

For a Recently Discovered Shipwreck at the Bottom of Lake Michigan 45

Breathing Water 48

The Love Story 49

Years Later, I Introduce My Brother to Person X, and Am Asked If I Was Adopted 50

To the One at the Bottom of Loch Ness 52

Names of Actual Places You'll Pass on Your Way to Building a New Life 53

Crocodiles 54

Rare Architecture 56

The Size of the Earth and That Which It Contains 58

Editorial Reviews

Olzmann’s masterful debut heralds the arrival of a delightful and daring poetry that scorches and coils its way through galaxies, strip malls, and the intricacies of the human body. With a wickedly delightful wisdom at its core, Mezzanines practices the most graceful kind of alchemy—its greatest strength is how it turns tiny heartbreaks into a bright and satisfying beauty.” —Aimee Nezhukumatathil

“Olzmann has an outsider’s wit and a boarder crosser’s slick vision. From seam, threshold, and cut, these poems navigate the galactic and the aquatic, the immediate and the imaginary, the reasonable and the American. He’s amused by his own bewilderment. What’s more, he manages to never abandon love. Olzmann’s skilled play, terrific ear, and immense heart make Mezzanines a must-read.” —Pat Rosal

“With Mezzanines Matthew Olzmann has given us a vibrant new poetry, as soulful as it is funny. Sci-fi and snake charms, love poems, ship wrecks, and a dash of artful self-parody—the materials of his narratives come from all over the cosmos to find, in this wonderful poet’s hands, a shape crackling with power that’s connective, convincing, and true.” —David Baker


“Olzmann’s masterful debut heralds the arrival of a delightful and daring poetry that scorches and coils its way through galaxies, strip malls, and the intricacies of the human body. With a wickedly delightful wisdom at its core, Mezzanines practices the most graceful kind of alchemy—its greatest strength is how it turns tiny heartbreaks into a bright and satisfying beauty.” —Aimee Nezhukumatathil

“Olzmann has an outsider’s wit and a boarder crosser’s slick vision. From seam, threshold, and cut, these poems navigate the galactic and the aquatic, the immediate and the imaginary, the reasonable and the American. He’s amused by his own bewilderment. What’s more, he manages to never abandon love. Olzmann’s skilled play, terrific ear, and immense heart make Mezzanines a must-read.” —Pat Rosal

“With Mezzanines Matthew Olzmann has given us a vibrant new poetry, as soulful as it is funny. Sci-fi and snake charms, love poems, ship wrecks, and a dash of artful self-parody—the materials of his narratives come from all over the cosmos to find, in this wonderful poet’s hands, a shape crackling with power that’s connective, convincing, and true.” —David Baker

From the Publisher