Myth of Arrival

FREE POETRY @ 9:17 a.m.

This morning I was looking at my bookshelves sagging under the combined weight of all the poetry books I have collected over the years and realized something has gotta give. Ohhh, yes. For years I've lived under the motto: A boy can't have enough books of poetry … unless he is fleeing from House Arrest.

But I asked myself: Self, do I still read all these books? No. Do I still even like all of them? No. So why I am holding onto them? Maybe somewhere out in the void someone will want my copy of 18 Yargling Poets of Upper Yarglesvakia? The poorly translated versions of poet master Grunthos the Flatulent's Ode to a Small Lump of Green Putty I Found in My Armpit One Midsummer Morning? Or all that terrible Coleridge I don't know what to do with?

So here is what I suggest. Drop me an e-mail telling me you are sending me a randomly rejected book of poetry of your own in the mail and I will drop a randomly selected book¹ in the mail for you. All it will cost you is shipping/ handling, which is a lot cheaper than even the Library $1.25 Sale you normally go to.

Will I like the book you send me? Will you like the one I send you? Who knows. But it will be new poetry, and that is good. Write me at zachary.jean [at] gmail dot com

1. And these are actual "books" versus "6 Stapled Pages Run Off On A Copy Machine Someone's Kid Sister Sold To Me for $2 The Night I Went To A Poetry Reading Really Drunk" [back]