Baus's second collection picks up where his debut, To the Sound
, left off, exploring the ways we mishear, misread and misunderstand, and offering novel means of reading a kind of insular, new language. The prose poems and sequences that compose this book are fragmentary, funny and willfully confusing in the service of pointing up what words can't say. One poem, “Orange Water” reads, in part, “The bloom. The boiling water. Bees. Real flowers release bees. Real flowers bloom orange. Real bees bloom in boiling water. Real water releases bees. Boiling real bees release flowers. The flowers bloom.” The poem flirts with both sense and nonsense. This kind of poetry is not for everyone, but to fans and curious readers looking for unusual ways of thinking about what words can do, Baus may seem capable of casting a spell with language, sound and sense. (June)
