t. kilgore splake
Perfectbound paperback, ISBN:  978-0-9965026-2-7, 64 pgs., $13.95

Currently Out of Print

tommy’s desk, the latest collection of poems by small press icon t. kilgore splake, explores the connection of nostalgia and mortality.  splake’s poems make full use of associative leaping, with each image or memory centered in the middle of the page, to suggest a staccato, non-linear reading.  Now in his late seventies, splake is a unique American poet whose style is unlike anyone else’s.  From his isolated home in Northern Michigan, he riffs on popular culture past and present, relationships and social attitudes.  He also writes from the perspective of a profound love of the natural world, as contrasted to human culture.  The title poem, tommy’s desk, is a long poem that uses the objects on the poet’s desk as launch pads for reflection.  Recommended to those who appreciate outsider art.

“t. kilgore splake continues to provoke an unusual and thought-provoking brand of poetry.”                    – James A. Cox, The Midwest Book Review

“For lovers of American poetry that flourishes under the radar, wandering through the slow, steady experience of recollecting the past with poet t. kilgore splake will be an experience of ineluctable delight.  There is an incantatory sweep to the author’s voice which invites the splake-savvy reader to trance out with  the  speaker,  go  with  the   flow  –   mesmerized,  as if by a stranger’s monologue in a dusty Upper Peninsula bar, dust motes dancing against the sun-spattered windowpane. . .”                   – George Wallace, The Pedestal Magazine

“Splake is always spot-on with an unfailing eye and gift for compressed expression.  As a fan of Splake’s for over two decades, I can honestly say, I anticipate each new collection of his and am never disappointed.”               – Alan Catlin