While Standing in Line for Death

While Standing in Line for Death

<div><p><strong>Winner of the 30th Annual Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry</strong></p><p>"From these rituals come notes; from those notes come poems; and from those poems comes not just a view into his process, but an entrance into another present." —<I>Boston Globe</I></p><p>After his boyfriend Earth's murder, CAConrad was looking for a (Soma)tic poetry ritual to overcome his depression. This new book of eighteen rituals and their resulting poems contains that success, along with other political actions and exercises that testify to poetry's ability to reconnect us and help put an end to our alienation from the planet.</p><p><I>unfastened<BR>in the backseat a<BR>portion of the music is<BR>mucus flying into stillness<BR>at what point do we submit<BR>to the authority of flowers<BR>at what point after it enters<BR>the mouth is it no longer in the<BR>mouth but the throat the colon<BR>making sumptuous death of the world<BR>this is what crossing the line gains<BR>no need to pretend we<BR>are the people we<BR>want to be in<BR>the next life<BR>bone under<BR>tongue drives<BR>taste of snow to metal…</I></p><p><B>CAConrad</B> is the author of <I>ECODEVIANCE: (Soma)tics for the Future Wilderness, A Beautiful Marsupial Afternoon</I>, and <I>The Book of Frank</I>, as well as several other books of poetry and essays. Most recently, he has co-edited <I>Supplication: Selected Poems of John Wieners</I>. A 2014 Lannan Fellow, a 2013 MacDowell Fellow, and a 2011 Pew Fellow, he also conducts workshops on (Soma)tic poetry and Ecopoetics.</p></div>