3 Reasons You’ll Love A Deep & Gorgeous Thirst

Sex! Drugs! Rock & Roll! And booze! Boozey boozey booze!

What I’m on about here is the book that we’ve just set loose on the hearts and minds of this fair city and the world:

A Deep & Gorgeous Thirst

Okay, so — to be fair, I realize poetry isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. It’s a niche market…and a mighty small niche at that. So here’s my 3-point pitch, why I truly believe this book can reach a few new readers who otherwise never considered themselves fans of poetry:

First: It’s about drinking! The good, the bad, and the ugly of it — the raucous, drunken, mad, idiotic, regrettable, and joyous escapades. And I truly believe that, if your thirst is as deep and gorgeous as mine, if you and your friends have a few drunken tales of your own, then this book will be a helluva lot of fun.

Second: It’s not about drinking at all. I mean, yeah, sure, every poem has booze in it — but it merely serves as the lens through which a much bigger, more complex tapestry is woven. This book, like all art really, is about just two things: love and death — that profoundly joyous and terrible human predicament. The booze is just easier to see! Look deeper and you’ll find a book that is vulnerable and tortured, lost and confused — and in the next turn crazy, cackling, swaggering, and unhinged. The final result is a fractured, poetic mosaic —  a spiritual journey that has walked through the existential Badlands and forged, from them, a proud, hard-won redemption.

Lastly: It’s funny! Its like a fortune cookie my brother once chose: “If you can’t laugh at your own life, then it isn’t much.” Damn straight. All these stories testify to the utter jackasserywe are all (hopefully) capable of. “Some people never go crazy,” says Bukowski, “what truly horrible lives they must lead.” My guess is, if you’ve ever been drunk, if you’ve ever been insane, or lost, or too loud; if you’ve ever been lusty, or desperate; if you’ve ever been a little salty with authority; if you’ve ever struggled with love or no love; if you’ve done something you regret, or wished you’d done a helluva lot more to regret — you’ll find something hilarious and familiar in this book. And, sure, poetry isn’t everyone’s thing — but this is as approachable as I think poetry gets. There’s nothing terribly pompous or exclusionary, nothing opaque, or snooty. It’s a humble, human book, a book to laugh at, laugh with, and — in the end — drink to!

And you should. I hope you will,

Hosho

PS – Another drunk poem, for your reading pleasure…(anyone remember $2 Tuesdays?)

$2 Tuesdays

at Brewsters and

you and your friends

have been at it

all night, having

convinced a bartender that

an Irish Car Bomb is

only one $2 drink.

 

You’re all righteously

shit-faced, and even though

you all have jobs and school

and responsibilities tomorrow,

no one gives a shit tonight,

tonight you’ve all said

to hell with worrying

and even if you’re

hungover, you figure

you’ll just deal with it

tomorrow.

 

Because tonight you’re all here

together, laughing, and

free, and when the

waitress brings the tab

the fucking thing

unfurls to your shoe-tops.

 

“Holy shit!” your buddy says.

 

And someone else says

“Are you kidding me?”

 

And someone else says,

“No—that’s impossible!”

 

And someone else says

the bill is like the

Dead Sea Scrolls, and

you all start laughing.

 

And while he’s signing

his credit card receipt

your buddy says,

all Yul Brynner-style,

“So let it be known,

so let it be written…”

and you’re all tottering

like Moses coming down

from the stormy mountain,

too drunk to figure out

who owes what, and

it’s a good thing too,

because between the lot of you,

you had something in the

neighborhood of

sixty drinks,

which, you decide,

might be a

problem—

 

but only if you’ve

just got enough

for fifty.