This book is 23 pages of short poems. The poems are blunt and vivid. Each poem made an immediate impression on me. It's not the type of poetry that you have to study and stare at for a long time, crystal ball like, to intuit the meaning. They're sharp and quick and emotionally hard hitting.
A lot of the poems are composed of sentences that have been cut into poetic lines, which is something I like. There's just something about a well put together sentence that's admirable in its own right.
This is one part of a poem from Witch Babies that I kept reading over and over until I ended up memorizing it without trying:
Drowning in a pool of water
that may or may not
actually be there
while listening to 1983's
number one hit record
and not really giving
a shit
either way.
I like that so much. I feel like that's a close to perfect sentence. This is another part of a poem that I liked a lot:
He did not regret
his wanting
although he
may have regretted
the fulfillment
but what else
is there
to say about
desire.
I would like it if I didn't see my acne
as a manifestation of my inner self
but this is difficult when my thoughts resemble swine
and there is nothing in my heart worth admiration.
There is an amusement park
on the ground with
rollercoasters
like shoestrings
and the hills still
hold green leaves but
when we took off
what lay beneath
was a snowstorm
and coal mills
and a graveyard.
The book/zine/chapbook looks like something you would see being read aloud from at a death metal concert or a pagan ritual in the middle of the forest. It has a sweet looking hand printed sigil on the cover, a lot of beautiful illustrations by Carabella Sands, and a bloody fingerprint on the last page.
Witch Babies is all sold out now (more copies would presumably mean more bloody fingerprints), but even better news is that Escoria's full-length poetry collection Witch Hunt is going to be released next year through Lazy Fascist Press, so be sure to get a copy of that when it comes out. (excerpt)
