Blue 4 U
Chapbook, Nicholas Teixeira, 60 pgs, Dream Pop Press, dreampoppress.net, $11.95
Nicholas Teixeira is like a hyper Max Headroom, be-bopping his way through an explosion of pop culture and its intersection with the self. Star Wars, The Golden Girls, Sesame Street, Old Navy, SEGA and Sears all get name dropped and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. No corner of the last half century is spared, and it all begins with The Muppet Show.
The majority of the poems in Blue 4 U are written “after” a particular Muppet Show episode, guest or moment: “after John Denver on The Muppet Show… after everything comes up Liza on TMS… after Anne Murray takes TMS for a ride.” For the most part, the text doesn’t directly refer to anything that took place in the named episode. The “after” statements are more like a launching point — a generator of feelings and impressions that add a layer of cryptic meaning to the window we’re peering through.
At the core of these poems you’ll find what lies at the heart of most poems: relationship problems. Teixeira’s difficulties are most often laid out like they’re being texted by a confused teen (there’s still a bit of that in all of us): “If only I could explain my self to u, / plainly, I might not lose u. U’d stay here w/ me as I carry- / on, not over u, 4 me, 2 c u, above me, behind 1 break-up.”
This collection is generally affable, but the teen text talk can be off-putting at times. It’s definitely recommended for Muppet-heads and, as Teixeira writes, anyone “struggling to understand love in disorder.”
