David Selzer’s first collection of poems for Armadillo Central focuses on people, both known and unknown to the author. The 20 poems showcase David’s skill with words and understanding of their innate power and natural rhythm.
A Jar of Sticklebacks explores themes as diverse as love, death, racism, war, nature, popular culture and the passing of time. Each poem is imbued with a gentle sensitivity and a generosity, to both subject matter and reader, which harks back to the old-school poets. While David refers to some of these masters in his Afterword: Auden, Yeats, Larkin, Hughes and Plath, to name just a handful; his voice is entirely original, anchored in his own rich life experience.
Visit David Selzer‘s page to find out more about him. The retro cover was designed by Daz Smith with jar and stickleback drawn by Jennifer Copley-May.
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Formats:
ISBN 978-1-908539-00-7 PRC/Mobi for Amazon/Kindle
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ISBN 978-1-908539-02-1 PDF
UK Kindle: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B008CQAU5E
USA Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008CQAU5E
POEMS – A Jar of Sticklebacks, David Selzer, 2011:
A Short History
Portrait Of The Artist
At Mycenae 1984
Far Above Rubies
Looking For Puffins: South Stack Revisited
The Valley Of The Amarici, Kwazulu-Natal, April 2006
Accidents
Under November Skies
Chuzpah
George Gershwin At Chirk Castle
Lost
Parting The Ways
The Outing
Trigger At The Adelphi, Liverpool, March, 1954
While You Were Sleeping
A Bit Of A Shambles
A Terrible Place
Kliptown, Soweto – April 2010
Natural Selection
A SHORT HISTORY
For a generation,
like weather cocks,
their skeletons swung near the highway.
James Price and Thomas Brown had robbed the Mail.
Years turned. The Gowy flooded and the heath
flowered. Travellers noted the bones
hanging in chains by the Warrington road.
Justices ordered the gibbet removed,
the remains disposed of. In Price’s skull,
while Napoleon was crossing the Alps
or Telford building bridges or Hegel
defining Historical Necessity
or Goya painting Wellington’s portrait,
a robin made its nest.
© David Selzer 2011
CHUTZPAH
A nor’ easterly blew – over Dutchman Bank –
on the front at Beaumaris, so we had
our chips, fish and mushy peas in the Vectra,
watching the ebb tide slowly, slowly expose
the furrowed gold of the Lavin Sands
and the cormorants and oyster catchers
skim the waves, when, suddenly, a herring gull,
that voracious omnivore, that frequenter
of rubbish tips and landfills, landed on our
bonnet and, not six feet from a town council
notice forbidding the feeding of said beasts,
watched us eat each pea, chip, fish flake and morsel
of batter (meanwhile blocking the view) and then
just buggered off – the colours of its plumage,
eyes and skin pristine, as if painted.
© David Selzer 2011