The Unreasonable Slug [Paperback]

Matt Cook (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 2007

“Not long ago one of Milwaukee poetry’s young turks, Cook is now simply one of the city’s major poets.”—Milwaukee Magazine

Perfect for people who “don’t like poetry,” Matt Cook’s distinctive writing is Midwestern yet worldly, rooted yet bohemian. His close observations result in poems that resemble a series of punk fortune cookies, a kind of psychedelic horse sense—discovering musicality and humor in cultural information, in family, in writing itself.

“The Modernist Bowling Alley”

The forgotten soul who first separated egg whites.
The homeless man wearing the Superman T-shirt.
Their intentions were clearly understood,
Except when they were unintentional and misunderstood.
The Madagascar moth is no longer destroying the prized sweaters
With anywhere near his previous curve of frequency.
Shoddy construction is now the more critical threat.
The modernist bowling alley will have the futuristic waiting area
Where you can go and wait patiently for the future.
You will see a clock on the wall that doesn’t really look like a clock.
You will distinctly remember having forgotten that before.

Matt Cook is the author of In the Small of My Backyard and Eavesdrop Soup. His work has been featured on NPR’s Fresh Air and The Writer’s Almanac.

Product Details

• Paperback: 128 pages
• Publisher: Manic D Press, Inc. (April 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1933149159
• ISBN-13: 978-1933149158
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,720,961 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars There's no room for cream...and no need for it, either, March 3, 2008

By 

Chris LaVesser "Goofball on bowed legs" (Pewaukee, WI) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Unreasonable Slug (Paperback)

Another wonderful collection of approachable poems...

Though I'm a voracious reader, I often shy away from poetry because it's frequently so laden in impenetrable imagery and layering that I take nothing away from it. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy having to think about a poem. I enjoy doing some interpretation. I enjoy wondering if the poem means the same to me as it does to its author. But I do not enjoy needing a pile of reference material and an Orphan Annie Secret Decoder Ring to appreciate a poem.

Enter Matt Cook.

Matt Cook's poems are all approachable. I take something away from all of them. This is not to say they lack sophistication or depth. While some are silly and fun, they are intentionally so, and the better for it. The others are quite intelligent and clever, and I enjoyed pondering some of them at length. But in the end, I could find meaning in all of them.

Cook is more than a wonderful writer; he is quite obviously a wonderful observer as well. He captures in his poems the things we fail to see in life, and my perspective on things changes every time I read one.

I believe you can't go wrong with any one of Cook's poetry collections. So go sit at Alterra and enjoy some poetry...

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fabulous, June 11, 2007

By 

L. Taylor (Quebec, Canada) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Unreasonable Slug (Paperback)

I absolutley loved this book. We need more poetry like this everywhere. I laughed, I puzzled, I had to read the book several times after receiving it out of sheer joy. I recommend anyone interested in poetry or trying to get others interested in poetry to get this book. The writing is unassuming and delightful.

5.0 out of 5 stars Hilarious, Uproarious, Endlessly Quotable, July 16, 2011

By 

Matt M. Martin "No, One" (Fort Collins, CO) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Unreasonable Slug (Paperback)

I had the privilege of knowing Matt Cook while in the same MFA program with him in Memphis, so my opinion is a bit biased, but I will say that he is one of these writers who, if you don't love his work, you simply don't know who he is.

Matt's poems are pure magic, full of humor and quotable lines (the quotable lines are so profuse it's hard to give a sampler--I might as well transcribe the entire book). The poems have a wonderful sense of mirth and wordplay: Cook not only questions language and aphorisms but common advice in general, and then those giving the advice, and then the idea of giving advice at all, finally calling into question the whole world. And he does this with constant humor, brevity, and honest-to-goodness wit. He's a very, very funny man with a entirely unique take on any situation. Once he said one of his strange, perfect one-liners and someone asked him, "Is that from a movie?" "Nothing I say is ever from any movie," Matt replied, laughing.

I read this collection as soon as I bought it, then I went back and read it again. I've owned it for two days now, but I'm positive I'll read it many more times, like classic Onion articles or Calvin and Hobbes strips.