CIRCLING OVERHEAD

This, I think, is my one true lost chapbook.

I thought I had a copy floating around somewhere,

but I'll be damned if I can find it.

Can't even do a Google Image search

for the cover art.

1995 from Janet Kuypers at Scars Publications,

20 years before she published

A NATION OF ASSHOLES W/ GUNS,

which everyone should buy, of course.

CIRCLING got me my first serious review

(at least that I'm aware of),

and I use the word "serious" quite loosely.

I forget what 'zine the review appeared in

(another victim of the basement flood),

but the review opened up by snidely referring to me

as a "hipster" and a purveyor of

"gritty urban realism",

which I thought was sort of odd since the

combined population of the 4 towns I'd lived in up to

that point was probably less than 40,000, and each town

had at least one dairy farm,

and usually an assortment of sheep, goats,

chickens and horses.

Oh well.

The review ended with the author suggesting that

my outlook on life might improve if I got laid.

And thus was I introduced to the world

of serious literary criticism.

I was verbally attacked by Jim Morrison's

Wiccan ex-girlfriend a few years later,

and that was pretty awesome too.