So Recently Rent a World: New and Selected Poems, 1968-2012

by Andrei Codrescu

Overview

Raconteur, poet, and NPR commentator Andrei Codrescu delivers in his inimitable, irreverent style a collection that traverses subjects from aging to consumerism, to religion to mass media. Brilliantly funny yet deeply insightful, these poems illuminate Codrescu's acerbic tone and outsized personality and capture the best of his oeuvre.

Andrei Codrescu was born in Sibiu, Romania, in 1946, and immigrated to the United States in 1966. The author of more than thirty-five books, Codrescu has edited the literary magazine Exquisite Corpse, and his provocative commentary is featured regularly on National Public Radio's All Things Considered. Codrescu currently resides in Arkansas.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781566893008
Publisher:	Coffee House Press
Publication date:	12/11/2012
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Heavyweight Champion Poet, essayist, novelist, screenwriter, and world-class raconteur, Andrei Codrescu was born in Sibiu, Romania in 1946, and immigrated to the United States in 1966. Author, translator, and anthologist of more than thirty-five books, Codrescu has edited the literary magazine Exquisite Corpse, and his provocative commentary is featured regularly on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered. His honors include the Peabody Award for his film Road Scholar, the international Ovidius Prize, the ACLU Freedom of Speech Award, as well as a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship for poetry. Codrescu currently resides in Arkansas, while continuing to serve as MacCurdy Distinguished Professor of English at Louisiana State University.

Table of Contents

so recently a rent world: new and selected poems by andrei codrescu

TABLE OF CONTENTS

bridge work
architecture
master manole to anna
the wallpaper of mr. r.k (after max jacob)
a leafy angel (to the columns hotel)
did something miss new orleans?
the mold song
comrade past & mister present
lu li and weng li
lu li 27 poems
weng li 40 poems
leaves of nerves
alice henderson-codrescu 14 poems
julio hernandez 8 poems
some days
saturnian dilemma
tete-a-tete
sonnet for allan kornblum
the penal cavalry
evening particulier (for max jacob)
avanti
the monk
calvin boone, osd 18 poems
de natura rerum
& ("I hate...")
here
secret training
dream (1)
the urges
dream (2)
power
silence
on translation
biographical notes
5 ways of saying the same thing
designs
& power
untitled ("and in her memory...")
epitaph
“the woods” at midnight
breakfast elegy
what want ye
the view from the baby seat
crossed hands
sweat the small stuff
circle jerk
the gambling phoenix
ode to curiosity
untitled ("MAN" and "WOMAN"...)
ode to laryngitis
paper on humor
october 17
october 19
face portrait
early fix
new morning
a grammar
poetry paper
sea sickness
the history of the growth of heaven
the good spirit
why write
eugenio montale in california
a point
books
san francisco for whomever
late night san francisco
three types of loss
roto: how the bourgeois dream
petite madeleine
2 plays
volcanic dirge & co.
thieves seasons
bilingual
les fleurs de cinema
port of call
mail
poetry
the travels of a vigilante
body blues
casting
new york
to my heart
russia or the weakness of photography
the life on film of st. theresa
jingling the cookery
getting there
the yes log
paper on humor
the new gazette
invitation to a molecular feast
en passant
the question of personnel
the differences (for barbara szerlip)
the marriage of insult & injury
a cook in hell
toward the end of 1969
tetrachlorine
election
the fourth of july (for ted berrigan)
the park
orbital complexion
xerox the spirit and be well
space souffle
old snake ponders
old cities
sadness unhinged
against meaning
music ("there were no bums in my pores...")
belligerence belligerence
demands of exile (for dorin tudoran)
y un cancion por e.
eulogy for men (for ruxandra)
momentary bafflement with return home at dawn
coquillage
a serious morning
irony as nursery
the threat
sexual politics
near sonnet
untitled ("It takes joy to listen..."
drowning another peasant inquisition
at home
opium for archie anderson
poem
blues for casanova
dear masoch
peter boone: 9 poems (divided by asterisks; run continuous)
love and the documents
remembrance of my forgotten skinniness
muffled by a belt across the mouth
all they do is talk
snail sail
opium for britt wilkie
manifesto
the origin of electricity
a face
about photography
salt
desk 07 in the reading room at the british library
the inner source
every tie
november 6, 1984
punished by capitalism
tristan tzara the man who said no (for kenneth koch)
ars polis
the discovery of prayer
cohere britannia
topiary
when lightning struck, I
when lightning struck, II
slot-o-topia
lipstick bicycle
model work
visitors from the dancing world
sunday sermon
1968 for leonard cohen
a geography of poets
virgin mule
the goldrush
looks from money
rain
working for profit
the imagination of necessity
love simmers the stew of the dead
staying with it
don't wait for me
the masses are constantly on the telephone
music
your country
old photo
trains
the police
seeing out of the sub (for alice)
untitled ("just because there is more sex..."
matinee
a good thing when i see one
a still
selavie
the other end
drizzle off the ocean
wishes
the work & the labor
mnemogasoline
the first icon with gun
in the supermarket
dollar dance
au bout du temps
in the picture above (for laura)
stock report
the american dream
how it happened
grammar
the best side of me
us
the revolution and the poet
eliade: a poem it was today
I'm here to open a couple of wounds
in jerusalem on my 48th birthday
let us now praise a famous fool (for james hillman)
essay
a petite histoire of red fascism
five one-minute eggs
as tears go by
a francis ponge
houses, scams, languages
january 3, 2001
to poetry
brancusi's bird
school daze I
not a pot to piss in
laura
birthday poem & bed-frame i.o.u
the portuguese eat a dish
wisdom
"keep old hat in secret closet"
in memory of the 20th century
christmas in new york (for laura)
nickelodeon
history and (poetry) class
dave's dream
my going out dream
to have its dream
french quarter morning
the new millenium
auschwitz and the summer of love
"if you're news you're meat"
my name is andrei codrescu (for tristan)
torture and evolution
signifier
legacy: letters it was today, but please note and correct major name mistake
the incoming sneeze or the old man's nose
the zen post office (for pat nolan)
my son came over
babies and the two
often after a public event
alberta
history
fear
talismanic ceremony for lucian
sheep (patriotic poetry)
sit down
untitled ("Honesty can't be encouraged..."
for thom gunn
center piece
the lady painter
narcissus fattened
on drunkenness
to a young poet
another year
sentenced to the frost
the gulf of mexico (social realism)
work
walnuts
ars poetica
arse poetica 2: the art of restraint
life haikus
david franks
blue jew notes
intention (for tom clark)
pastoral
a human touch misunderstood
ars poetica (for ludwig zeller)
once
present at the ceremony

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Entertainment Weekly, included in "Must List" (2012 Year-end issue, tablet version)

“One of our most prodigiously talented and magical writers.” —New York Times Book Review

"So Recently Rent a World gathers new poems and selections from the 16 books of verse that Codrescu has published since arriving in the U.S. as a teen refuge from communist Romania...'So Recently Rent a World let me to put a period on four decades writing and the old culture that the writing reflected."—The Times-Picayune

Editorial Reviews

Entertainment Weekly, included in "Must List" (2012 Year-end issue, tablet version)

“One of our most prodigiously talented and magical writers.” —New York Times Book Review

"If Codrescu's poetry has represented to some extent a mordant or ironic paen of the schizophrene, this observer has loved it. By providing this illogical logic, often using a surrealist lens, Codrescu illumines just how fractured our lives have become. He does so with a deft painterly touch. . . . In this new and selected book of poems, Codrescu is still one of our most skilled interlocutors and he sings above the abyss skillfully."—Best American Poetry

"So Recently Rent a World gathers new poems and selections from the 16 books of verse that Codrescu has published since arriving in the U.S. as a teen refuge from communist Romania...'So Recently Rent a World let me to put a period on four decades writing and the old culture that the writing reflected."—The Times-Picayune

"Andrei Codrescu is today the great American poet of intercultural encounter, absolutely exceptional in his capacity to elucidate with analytical power, emotional sensitivity, and lyric force the most revealing points of tension between ethical and imaginative perceptions in a world under the gun. With sympathy for eruptions against authority, Codrescu has infused child-man rebellion and passionate desire into the many poems of self-recollection that are now presented with incisive comment and context in this 408 page collection entitled So Recently Rent a World: New and Selected Poems: 1968-2012."—The Bacon Review

From the Publisher