The poems in “Fish Out of Water” are divided into three sections. The first section, “A rainy day in the life of Planet Earth” consists of fragmented and sometimes jarring works due to their approach, but they somehow still skirt insightful political intent. For instance, in the poem Fluff, the first three of four stanzas respectively speak about a “Third-World kid named Carlos”, “the little Rwandan girl”, and a “boy soldier of Iraq”. Following this, is a final self-reflexive stanza that speaks about the choice to make poetry. The effect falls short of irony, because there is a “fluffy” sincerity to these plights the writer’s alluding to. Indeed, this strategy is the very strength of the poem. The second and third sections of this chapbook, “Escape from the land of the losers” and “For the girl with the green lampshade”, leads the reader further and further into a world of unrequited pimple-faced romantic love. The poems revel in a disquieting tone of yesteryear both in content and in style. (PVP)
Chapbook, 2000, 24 pages, $1, Andreas Gripp, harmonia press, London, Ontario, [email protected]