When You Say One Thing But Mean Your Mother
Who’s the queen of kundalini bloopers, Emily Dickinson’s attitude problem (that bitch) and California dreams? It’s Melissa Broder, who will charm your pants off and show you a little tough love in this vivid, witty first collection of poems. Each poem is artisan-crafted in controlled couplets, weighty triplets, tight syllabics and assonance that will take the top of your head off. But you won’t have the time to absorb the academic monkeyshine–so absorbed you’ll be on the flip side of Bat Mitzvah stress-syndrome, Aunt Sheila’s in Taos, vampires in absentia, and brand names, brand names, brand names. From junkie fetishism to a housewife with a special “thing” for laundry, Broder does dark with magnetic charisma and enchanting humor.
S. F. Examiner BOMB Review DecomP Review Poem: HTMLGiant
A Sample
Praise & Idolatry
"This debut from Broder…is as funny and hip as it is disturbing… quirkily compassionate…sexy, and at times even gross… Throughout, Broder searches for a place to stand, and for an object for her considerable sympathies. This is a bright and unusual debut."
-- Publishers Weekly
"Broder’s insight and honesty will make your brain light up and your hair stand on end"
"Melissa Broder’s poems are bad-ass ninja assassins smoking Camel straights and drinking Tab in blood-soaked satin tutus. Her new book is full of tightly-crafted, controlled explosions...When you think she can’t get any wilder, she climbs yet another rung…She speaks in many tongues, and all of them bite."
-- Jennifer Knox, Drunk by Noon
"…an energetic dissection of contemporary American life… penetrating and illuminating…a vibrant and eclectic collection."
-- PANK
"…obsessive, energetic and pop-culture-infused poetry."
-- TimeOut New York
"Melissa Broder's work offers readers a rush, buzz, panoply of pop culture, as well as her own boisterous brand of dark humor. But be warned: behind the irrepressible excess, an extremely clear-headed and sharp-witted poet is taking notes. Her unique gift for being both grounded and giddy at once gives this writing its delightfully wicked edge."
-- Elaine Equi, Ripple Effect
The Author
Melissa Broder is the chief editor of La Petite Zine and curates the Polestar Poetry Series. By day, she is a publicity manager at Penguin. Broder received her BA from Tufts University and is getting a slow, scenic MFA at CCNY. She won the 2009 Stark Prize for Poetry and the 2008 Jerome Lowell Dejur Award. Her poems appear, or are forthcoming, in many journals, including: Opium, Shampoo, PANK, Five Dials, The Del Sol Review, Word for/Word, Miracle Monocle, On Earth As It Is and Swink. She lives in Brooklyn.
Check out her website
