new from above/ground press: Cursed Objects, by Jason Christie

Cursed Objects
Jason Christie
$4

Bell, book and candle

ringing or unrung
a bell announces
the wilderness

rhythmic unbounding
of tone to source
an unhinged spillage
echoing without
what sounded deep
from within

paging or unpaged
a book announces
an interiority

covers flung askance
as though darkness
itself acted a doorway
as if patience guaranteed
a solipsistic frame
of mind or beams and lintel
as if waiting accrued pages
dust gathering time
with each mote latching
one second to the next

waxing or waning
a candle announces
darkness, only darkness

closed book, silent bell
unlit candle and doorway
silent page, muted metal
wax with no wick and
waste accumulates
under the nails
between the teeth
waiting until the flash
of light ignites each
page, melts wax, sets
a vacuum to ringing

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
November 2014
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy

Author’s Note:
The poems in Cursed Objects take our involvement with objects across the line of usability into a realm where objects reach back and affect us in ways we can neither foresee nor control. These objects are cursed in that they deviate from the use we prescribed for them and have achieved an uncomfortable new role, namely that of reflecting our twisted sense of dominion.

Jason Christie is the author of i Robot, Canada Post, and Unknown Actor. His chapbook, Government, published by above/ground press, was shortlisted for the 2014 bpNichol Chapbook Award. Jason lives in Ottawa with his wife and their one-year old son.

This is Jason Christie’s third above/ground press chapbook, after 8th Ave 15th St NW. (2004) and Government (2013).

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; outside Canada, add $2) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9 or paypal at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com