Nite Soil

Kenward Elmslie's way with words cuts a singular swath through a polymath variety of forms. This collection of poems and ephemera treats language sometimes as paint to be thrown on canvas, sometimes as a series of fascinatingly odd concrete objects and throughout, Elmslie takes full advantage of the word's status as an infinite well of signification. Elmslie's work navigates between the comic and the serious, between the personal and the political, and between the oblique and the straightforward so deftly that the reader is left breathless. Nite Soil is yet another great book by one of today's leading radical poets.

Poet, novelist, songwriter, and librettist Kenward Elmslie was one of the original members of the New York School of poetry, along with Frank O Hara, Barbara Guest, and John Ashbery. His many collections of poems range from Pavilions (1961) to Routine Disruptions (1998). His opera librettos were set by Ned Rorem and others, and his musical The Grass Harp (music by Claibe Richardson) has become a cult classic.

Kenward Elmslie's way with words cuts a singular swath through a polymath variety of forms. This collection of poems and ephemera treats language sometimes as paint to be thrown on canvas, sometimes as a series of fascinatingly odd concrete objects and throughout, Elmslie takes full advantage of the word's status as an infinite well of signification. Elmslie's work navigates between the comic and the serious, between the personal and the political, and between the oblique and the straightforward so deftly that the reader is left breathless. Nite Soil is yet another great book by one of today's leading radical poets.

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