Goose Hill

I've been making weekly visits to Mike Kaylor's print shop at the O'Neill Literary House to start working on the Sleight book project. So far I have the type for the first two poems set and have begun setting the type for the last one. Setting type letter by letter by space by punctuation mark is a tedious, slightly disorienting, but oddly relaxing task. Lines of poetry are set in the usual order: from top to bottom, from right to left (on the page)--with type that means that one places the character sorts (pieces of lead type) in this same order, but backwards and upside down on the composing stick. Even the character sorts themselves are the reversals their printed selves. So when searching around in the job case, 'b's look like 'd's, 'd's look like 'b's, 'p's look like 'q's, and 'q's look like 'p's. Sometimes we don't even realize we've switched these letters until we print the first sheet and proof...

Emily has finished her beautiful watercolor paintings illustrating my three poems: "Jack," "Queen of Clover," and "Childling King"--and I am in love with them. You can read the poems here , if you wanted. Now it's time to get down to the actual makings of the book. I am so excited! First, we need a press name. My press name for my solo projects is Goose Hill Press (could've guessed that one, right?); for my projects with Emma it is Chester Cat Press; and I'm still thinking about what to name my collaborations with Emily. Right now, I'm favoring Thread Lock Press, but we'll see what she thinks. And we've already got a title for the book itself. It is to be called Sleight . This title was decided upon because of the many ways in which this word naturally draws upon the themes inherent in the poems and paintings: Sleight as in "sleight of hand" card tricks (as explained in an earlier post, these three poems play with the Cal...