$14.99
“A ghost needs an audience or it is pointless,” writes Balma, and the same can be said about poets. “But does a ghost need a point?” she continues. No. Does a poet? Jeez, I hope not! Poems are toys, not vitamin pills, and these are full of playfulness. They’re also full of contradictions (see “Revelation at the Invisible Gun Show”), because between the contra- and the diction is where the poem is found. I won’t tell you what “the best sad thing that’s happened to me all year” is, but it’s a doozy. Read on, reader, and let Katy Balma free your mind.
–David Kirby
From shell shuckers to aliens to the ghost of Sid Vicious, Gallimaufry & Farrago is a marvelous concoction steeped in myth, nostalgia, humor, and the chimerical. Sirens are juxtaposed with Dreamsicles, John Wayne rides in on a John Deere tractor, and Brigadoon and Salvador Dali are saluted in the titular poem about stopping time. Punctuated with startling similes like oysters as “angel testicles” and Abe Lincoln as a “Christmas specter,” Balma’s book is “a complex amalgam of positive and negative” imagery, shining with both wit and wonder.
–Simone Muench
The zigs and zags of Katy Balma‘s mind, in addition to offering a great ride, remind me that a straight line is what I want out of a ruler, not a poem. You should stand up when reading this book, because her poems don’t ponder or pander, they run.
–Bob Hicok
Gallimaufry & Farrago
by Kathleen Balma
$14.99, paper
978-1-63534-612-1
2018
Kathleen Balma is a Fulbright Fellow, teacher, librarian, and translator from every US state you never wanted to visit. Her writing awards include a Pushcart Prize and a Writer-in-Residence Fellowship from Rivendell Writers’ Colony. She lives in New Orleans.
Sarah Colon (verified owner) –
I can’t really do a better job describing these poems than the blurbs did, but I can say that Kathleen Balma’s poems stunned me with their imagination and humor. Her poetry has many of the same qualities that made me fall in love with Alice in Wonderland—whimsical and imaginative and brilliant and unpretentious. I thoroughly enjoyed reading these poems and I can’t wait to see more from this poet!
Rodney Jones –
Kathleen Balma is a poet of coruscating wit and great formal invention. A Balma poem delights on first reading with original phrases or startling images and deepens with further readings to reveal her rich, metaphysical intelligence. I have been following her poetry for years. She works in many modes and forms, she takes no word for granted, and she is afraid of nothing. Gallimaufry and Farrago is an unforgettable debut.
Tamara Miles (verified owner) –
I keep dipping into this book in stolen moments and coming away smiling, moved by one of the lines that just caught me in a sideways glance. “Crop circles are circling the station wagons,/buttering themselves for battle./Your grits will not save you.” Absolutely delicious, Katy. Shucks, keep going.