Sky Lounge [Paperback]

Mark Bibbins (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2003

Mark Bibbins finds damaged glamour at the fringes of respectability in this exceptional debut collection

I was born
with capable eyes,

a moveable heart
and time to spare.
—from “Euphorium”

In his restless and unpredictable debut, Mark Bibbins offers a virtuosic poetry. Lovers struggle to connect; groupies, hustlers, and corporate drones covet better—or at least different—lives; locations fluctuate, without forewarning, from bars to beaches to city streets. With beguiling tonal and formal variety, these poems question the ordinary and unwitting acceptance of the status quo as they hover where “error arranges itself.” As indebted to Stereolab and Siouxsie Sioux as to any poetic lineage, Sky Lounge introduces an imagination committed to making irreverence, sensuality, and elegy into a provocative new music.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"The aspiring lothario braves red jellies in the surf" below Bibbins's maximalist aerial establishment, "not conventionally pretty, not conventionally shaved, but a rail to rail against if there's time and there is." Out to defrock camp and thrust the garment onto its own forms, this debut can also quietly produce "the noise stars make when they fall."
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

“I love Sky Lounge. Mark Bibbins splices together idioms and idiolects into cool, smooth, transporting lyrics—compact monologues that also resemble radio plays, explosive and evaporating, with no wrong moves, and with a welcome surplus of charm.” —Wayne Koestenbaum

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Product Details

• Paperback: 72 pages
• Publisher: Graywolf Press (May 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1555973809
• ISBN-13: 978-1555973803
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6.4 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,718,473 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars He's good, July 23, 2008

By 

Valerie Porter "Valerie Porter" (Atlanta, Ga) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sky Lounge (Paperback)

It's been a while since I picked this one up, but I've enjoyed his poetry since Take Three. His poems stick with you like swallowed chewing gum. Years will pass without remembering you read them; then one random day, you'll be vacuuming dog hair off your brand new linen sofa and you'll have this sudden, irresistible urge to point the hose out the window and suck up the stars.

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Written with honesty and perception, January 13, 2004

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sky Lounge (Paperback)

Sky Lounge is a collection of free-verse poetry written with honesty and perception by Mark Bibbins. Variety and flux from day to day and lifetime to lifetime are central themes in this impressive and memorable collection. Mesh: If ever an enterprise/were doomed--/What was told to me:/gingerbread (poisoned),//strangers crushing/bric-a-brac,/I needn't have died/as many times.//Also herd of hazard/and love, the sky/over there fills with them./One to here knows//when, another to rue/the whirl. I endure,/merely, a forger/in the red bean.