Questions in Bed

by Stewart Cole

Overview

Incisive and intensely felt, Stewart Cole's striking debut collection reminds us that we too live in an age of anxiety, disoriented by doubt, and up late, compelled to confront the unanswerable. Sirens draw us to the inevitable fact of human suffering, black-winged redbirds perch aloof above our daily commutes, sex denies and drives our hunger for fidelity, and the comet speaks before it strikes.

In an unabashed celebration of intellect and a visceral engagement with our shadowy impulses, Cole's voice veers between the playful and the grave, pillow-talk and eulogy. And despite the odds, love — private, public, and free of false sentiment — emerges cloaked in a wit and intelligence at once elusive and warm.

From the urbane and civil to the lustful and dark, the poems of Questions in Bed, in an impressive synthesis of content and contour, depict the heat-seeking of our driven days and insomniac nights.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780864926845
Publisher:	Goose Lane Editions
Publication date:	09/28/2012
Series:	Icehouse Poetry Series
Edition description:	Letter press edition
Pages:	80
Product dimensions:	5.52(w) x 8.55(h) x 0.28(d)

About the Author

Stewart Cole's poems, essays, interviews, and reviews have appeared in the Fiddlehead, Quill & Quire, PRISM International, Studies in Canadian Literature, the anthology Rogue Stimulus, and in a chapbook entitled Sirens. He grew up in the Rideau Valley, south of Ottawa, and has lived in Victoria, Montreal, Fredericton, and Toronto.

Table of Contents

Merman 9

Inverting the Birds 10

A Rebuttal 11

1-1-9 13

Sirens 16

Weed 'Em and Reap 17

Questions in Bed 19

Chase Sequence 20

1 Proem: How It Must End

2 Ahistoric Man

3 Spermatazoom

4 Kindergardening

5 The Metamorphs

6 Interlude: Mute Swans Sing

7 Hooky

8 The Answer of Travel

9 On Togetherness

10 Epilogue: In Praise of Staying Put

Ovum 37

What Little History 38

Volta 39

Prenuptials 40

On Sitting Through The Rite of Spring 41

Generation 42

Questions in Bed 43

The Blind Voyeur 44

What September Swallows 45

I National Holiday Morning 47

II National Holiday, Morning After 49

Bedroom Commute 51

Gesundheit 53

In Emergency 54

At the Drone Recital 55

The Zero or the Egg 57

From the Café Occidental 58

Rehearsal 60

December Is Among Us 61

Providential Park 64

What's at Hand 66

Questions in Bed 67

Carrion Comfort 68

The Cocktail Growl 71

Eulogy for the Quick 72

The Freshly Made Bed 73

Apocalyptist 74

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Negotiating "the fragilities that make us go" and "the doubts that shame our dailiness," Stewart Cole coaxes his dissatisfaction into abundance, as if he were holding reality by the ankles and shaking the change from its pockets. This heap of detail, gathered by an attentive mind, is then generously scrutinized and shared. Curious and sensual, Questions in Bed is a book rich with memorable phrases and new ways of seeing." — David O'Meara

"Questions in Bed considers its questions with verve, in a clear voice that crackles with surprising word collocations and staccato consonance. The poems that spring from this music are much more a singing in their chains than a pointing to the chains themselves." — A.F. Moritz

"Shines in its intelligence and beauty." — Lampert Prize jury citation.

Editorial Reviews

"Questions in Bed is a quick study, yet it is with multiple readings that the nuance of the verse is revealed."

"[W]orks that are polished, varied, and often as anxious as the last moments in bed one might spend before embarking on a day of the unknown. ... Cole draws our attention to the distance we insist on maintaining between the natural and biological realities from which we spring and the hectic created world in which we wander. ... There is little peace in these poems, but much sharp-edged, knowing loveliness. Read it in bed; see what your dreams will dare to do with it."

"Questions in Bed considers its questions with verve, in a clear voice that crackles with surprising word collocations and staccato consonance. The poems that spring from this music are much more a singing in their chains than a pointing to the chains themselves."

"Questions in Bed considers its questions with verve, in a clear voice that crackles with surprising word collocations and staccato consonance. The poems that spring from this music are much more a singing in their chains than a pointing to the chains themselves." —

"Shines in its intelligence and beauty."

From the Publisher

"Questions in Bed considers its questions with verve, in a clear voice that crackles with surprising word collocations and staccato consonance. The poems that spring from this music are much more a singing in their chains than a pointing to the chains themselves."

A.F. Moritz

"Shines in its intelligence and beauty."

Lampert Prize jury citation

"Questions in Bed is a quick study, yet it is with multiple readings that the nuance of the verse is revealed."

Scene

"[W]orks that are polished, varied, and often as anxious as the last moments in bed one might spend before embarking on a day of the unknown. ... Cole draws our attention to the distance we insist on maintaining between the natural and biological realities from which we spring and the hectic created world in which we wander. ... There is little peace in these poems, but much sharp-edged, knowing loveliness. Read it in bed; see what your dreams will dare to do with it."

Arc Poetry Magazine - Kel Pero

"Questions in Bed considers its questions with verve, in a clear voice that crackles with surprising word collocations and staccato consonance. The poems that spring from this music are much more a singing in their chains than a pointing to the chains themselves." —

David O'Meara