See Jack

In his 19th collection of prose poems, Edson's imagination remains as bizarre as ever, although he breaks no new ground. Edson inflicts deformities of body and character onto his humans and inanimate objects alike, introducing, for example, “a woman whose face was a cow's milk bag” or a man who “had only one eye. In the other socket was a belly button.” The humor in these passages—such as when a man puts a hat on his head and “the hat thinks he's feeding it, and begins to swallow his head,” is often mingled with obscene or oddly tragic moments, as when a farmer announces to his wife that he is going to have sex with the cow he is about to slaughter. There are also rare instances of poignant beauty, such as a man whose daughter is a mouse, pressed dead between the pages of a book like a flower. Edson's fragmented tales often trail off into ellipses that alternately seem like lazy storytelling or a provocative tool. But longtime Edson fans will find as much to enjoy as in Edson's other books. (Apr.)