In his impressive bestiary, The Blind Loon, Ed Shacklee shows as keen an insight into the nature of the beast roaming free as into the beast within. This encyclopedic collection includes the commonplace python, monkey, crocodile, tortoise, camel; the mythical kraken, lamia, chimera, wyvern; the prehistoric ankylosaurus; the fantastical logorrhea, mope, snub, hipster. Shacklee doles out marvels, mischief and hilarity in The Blind Loon, and the breathtaking illustrations of Russ Spitkovsky provide an accompanying visual feast and are by themselves worth the price of admission.
A Fog of Blurbs
Their plumage is a sheen of words whose meanings are the same-
inveigling, too often heard, obnoxious birds, but tame,
their mewling call is pecks of praise without one speck of blame.
Indifferent if they foul their nests or poop rains on the rabble,
garrulously gathered on the garret eaves of Babel,
they preen as they pontificate on arts in which they dabble,
for truth goes out the window when the Blurbs fly into town;
a mist of cloying tidings, thought essential to renown,
their beaks grow long and longer and are uniformly brown.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Ed Shacklee, whose poetry has appeared in the Able Muse, Light, and Rattle among other journals, is a public defender who represents young people. He lives on a boat in the Potomac River. The Blind Loon is his first full-length collection.
Ed Shacklee, whose poetry has appeared in the Able Muse, Light, and Rattle among other journals, is a public defender who represents young people. He lives on a boat in the Potomac River. The Blind Loon is his first full-length collection.
Russ Spitkovsky was born in 1981, in Kiev, Ukraine. In 1992 he moved to Sunnyvale, California, in 1999 he moved to New York to attend the School of Visual Arts, in 2003 he received his Bachelors in Fine Arts and in 2009 he graduated with honors from the SVA MFA program. Russ Spitkovsky's artwork has been included in numerous national and international publications and exhibitions. He is one of the founders of CARRIER PIGEON and is currently editor in chief and contributor of the quarterly publication. In 2014, Russ helped create Guttenberg Arts, a multidisciplinary artist residency program. He currently resides in New York and is focusing his artwork in the area of Printmaking, particularly etching, photo-lithography and mono-prints. His work has been included in several national and international publications and art shows. He is interested in movement, composition and spontaneity in image making.
