Color and Light: poems

Objects don't have color (they give off light) and words don't have meaning (they give off vibration). Color and meaning are ours to determine and agree upon, but what if, first, we sift through our colloquial phrases, our idiomatic expressions, our perceptual experiences, until we enter a world of mutuality rather than human centrality? A poet of both Exteroception and Interoception at once, Kyle Schlesinger asks his reader to "Think with / Your Eyes," "Eyes like Buber." At turns both funny and heartbreaking, Color & Light reminds us that meaning is not intrinsic; it is relational-"I'll say differently / I won't say literally." -Sasha Steensen

A smart collection of poems representing the panoramic range of Kyle Schlesinger's talents. 'Far & Away, ' a brilliant rigorous formal experiment in language, is the culminating work among more casual and sometimes cinematic poems. A real page-turner with unpredictable joys along the way. -Annabel Lee