Mezzanines - Matthew Olzmann

nThere's something inherently spiritual about Olzmann's Mezzanines. . .

. It's a place of reflection and contemplation, a temporary reprieve from the world's chaos and a reach for a vision of paradise. --The Los Angeles Review of Booksn n n.

. .the poems [in Mezzanines] have doors that open and invite you inside. The rooms of the house may be odd, and the stairwells may lead in strange directions, but you, as the reader, remain beckoned.

[Olzmann] hasn't invited you in just to leave you. He's got stories to tell, and they're good. --The Huffington Post Blogn n nThere is no place Matthew Olzmann doesn't visit in his poignant debut.

From underwater to outer space, Mezzanines is a contained universe, constantly shifting through multiple perceptions of the surreal and the real. A lyrical conversation with mortality, Olzmann explores identity, faith, and our sense of place, with an acute awareness of our minute existence.n nFrom NASA Video Transmission Picked Up By Baby Monitor: n nHow many shadows are there left to name? nLogophobia is the fear of words.

Keraunothnetophobia nis the fear of falling man-made satellites. nImagine this last one: nyou walk outside and look to heaven nexpecting a sky lab plunging down on you--wires neverywhere, bolts loosening, metal body in flames. nInstead, you see only blue, endless blue, nthe color of a baby's new blanket, cloaking everything.n nMatthew Olzmann is a graduate of the MFA program for writers at Warren Wilson College.

His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Kenyon Review, New England Review, Inch, Gulf Coast, Rattle, and elsewhere. He's received fellowships from Kundiman and the Kresge Arts Foundation. Currently, he is a writer-in-residence for the InsideOut Literary Arts Project and the poetry editor of The Collagist.n n