Customer Reviews

People with Real Lives Don't Need Landscapes

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I don't read poetry all that often since graduating from the university, but I discovered this poetry collection gem through John Dolan's newspaper "the eXile" and all I can say is I forgot how great poetry can be! "People With Real Lives" is highly readable poetry, often funny and at times quite violent, and amazingly diverse in themes. Whether calling for the canonization of Mark David Chapman "He gets my vote for heaven/Shot him the required three times: 3 miracles" or lamenting a mouse that he kills by burning him in his oven in "How I Killed the Mouse" every poem is a small trip to somewhere unexpected. The saddest poems, however, deal with fate, the fate of Dolan, perhaps, or the fate of all of us, such as "No One's After You" or "The Problem is How To Thank". Our lives our small. We are so ungrateful. We deserve so much less and we received even less than that. This is the sadness underneath the violence and humor of this wonderful collection.