Monday, October 8, 2018

New Book! - Postcards From Jackson by Maia



Jackson is gone just a little over a year now, but I imagine him unlocking his mailbox to lift out this chapbook, hold it in his hands—a rich letter in thirteen poems from one of his dears. Delighted to his toenails. Honored. In possession of before-hidden treasure. Postcards from Jackson is a glimpse of the delicious correspondence between deep, artistic souls. For though Maía is speaking, you hear his voice, too—the shape of him, the incandescent quote, and the images that sprang from his living hands. We gather that Maía and Jackson share a Tsalagi heritage, a sense of belonging to multiple lives and families, a love of folk art, myth, lore, old-timey religion and a crow’s delight in details: “And a little box you made after your brother Joseph’s / long swim to a vanished horizon; open the lid / and a shining salmon leaps inside.” Postcards from Jackson seems to be a few poems talking to a friend—but becomes a cleansing storm, instructive, as much about the meaning of existence as the dream of it. It is the last, beautiful word in a long friendship and the beginning of a conversation, “new snow over old, layer on layer…” - Enid Osborn, Poet Laureate of Santa Barbara, CA, 2017-2019, author of When the Big Wind Comes
Jackson Wheeler was famous for the postcards he sent to friends for occasions great and small. Each card was pulled from obscurity with an eye to a particular recipient or with surety that the image would magically conjure the intended heir. How lucky for us that one of his beneficiaries is the luminous poet, Maía. In Postcards from Jackson, she has taken inspiration from the images on the cards and Jackson’s words to explore her own flight over the human terrain. The result is poems which illuminate a private dialogue and sing a music of reassurance to the communal family. These words are generous in their caring, expansive in their insights, and gracious in how beautifully they strum the lyric strings of poetry. - David Oliveira, Santa Barbara Millennial Poet Laureate, author of As Everyone Goes



We encourage our neighbors to buy Cholla Needles books at Rainbow Stew, Space Cowboy, and Raven's Books. Support our local distributors!

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