brandon scott gorrell’s dmnbiwthabp is a poetry collection out from muumuu house in 2009. it is 88 pages, not broken into any sections. it has very short poems in it and also very long poems and medium length poems
subjects in the book are email, boredom, alienation, aliens, thesaurus.com, social injustice, and apocalypse
i shoot aliens in their heads and their heads explode
the tone in the book seems kind of minimalist based on the abrupt transitions and direct sentences
some poems also seem ‘maximalist’ based on being multiple pages and having a kind of ‘rambling’ tone
i got two emails today
i was disappointed by both of them
this happens on a daily basis
what does my life mean
also
hunger is the body’s response to lack of nutrients and stuff
why am i typing this
a lot of the book is written to a ‘you.’ the poem ‘butterfly apocalypse’ ‘recounts’ an online conversation between ‘you’ and ‘i’
i said i’m smoking
i said do you find smoking attractive or unattractive, what should i do
you said i find everything you do attractive
i said you are nice
i said i’m sending you a song and we will feel closer
you said can this song play when we meet
in a poem that begins ‘i was frozen in amber for 53 million years,’ the speaker says ‘i crush people with the time i’ve spent in amber’
one poem in the book included a lot of facts about oppression and social injustice
phamaceutical corportations have convinced a large number of people that they think incorrectly; that they must take pills to change the way they think, otherwise they will fail at work, school, and personal relationships
there is a target audience for talk shows and infomercials
a very small number of white men control what billions of people see and hear, which indirectly means that they control what billions of people think and feel
there are around 2.5 gallons of water in every toilet in america while in africa the water is poisoned or there are massive shortages
this list of facts felt surprisingly compatible, to me, with the ironic/maybe 'deadpan' voice in most of the book
in my opinion the main feeling of the book is expressed in the poem ‘some inconceivable crisis thing’
has anyone else ever felt incredibly sarcastic about feeling incredibly depressed but at the same time felt incredibly depressed
the book feels like a sarcastic version of 'the yellow wallpaper' but not completely sarcastic
also there is a lot of imagery of apocalypse and battles between aliens/robots and humans, which seems to metaphorically reinforce the feeling of 'breakdown' mentioned in the title and in the book
after reading this book, i feel pretty interested in reading the brandon book crisis
here is brandon scott gorrell’s blog
here is brandon scott gorrell’s formspring
here are 3 poems from the book
here are 4 poems from the book in different versions
here are a lot of online writings by brandon scott gorrell; some of them are in the book, some aren’t
buy this book here, here, or here
