Cows on the Freeway: Selected Poems (Paperback)

~ G. Murray Thomas (Author)
Key Phrases: poetry dog, dialing wrong numbers, Murray Thomas

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Cows on the Freeway is a collection of poems inspired by the ocean and freeways of Southern California. These poems were polished in performances on stages as diverse as Lollapalooza, The Whiskey, National Poetry Slams, and coffeehouse open mikes. They combine a sharp critique of modern life with an absurd sense of humor.

About the Author

G. Murray Thomas is best known as editor of Next…, a poetry calendar and newsmagazine. He has been an active participant in the Southern California poetry scene for more than a decade, performing in almost every major poetry venue there. His work has appeared in many small press literary magazines.

Product Details

• Paperback: 132 pages
• Publisher: IUniverse (June 9, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 059509743X
• ISBN-13: 978-0595097432
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,106,064 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Bewildering Poet!, August 26, 2001

By	Victor Infante (Worcester, MA United States) - See all my reviews

In the title poem of his new book, Cows on the Freeway, poet G. Murray Thomas remarks on a radio report of a bovine incursion onto a SoCal freeway. Thomas, imagining the cows standing blithely amongst the rapid hustle of automobiles, imagines what they must be thinking. "These cows know," he writes, "there is something they must do/RIGHT NOW." This is Thomas's great gift as a poet, the unusual ability to see and be bewildered the thoroughly weird and unusual things that most of us take for granted. His poetry lives in a world of smog, neon and commercial radio, all of which seem flat compared to the people wondering around amidst them. In one poem, he remarks on the beauty of the oil refinery in Long Beach, noting "the sight of death/fascinates." Elsewhere, he finds himself realizing that he and his companions are the only white guys in a bar, that he's the only one staring at the pictures of Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X on the walls, and that he's the only one who doesn't know the dance moves to the song blaring through the radio. Thomas is a clear and (in the best sense) prosaic writer, and his thin portraits of the world unerringly communicate the oddity surrounding us all, the sense that something, maybe everything, isn't what it was supposed to be. And sometimes, when you listen to the same bad rock song played in interminable permutations, and listen to politicians make ridiculous leaps of logic, and people buy it without a question, well, maybe he's right.