Junk

Tommy Pico was recommended to me by Laura for the Queer Humor prompt of #QueerYourYear, and this was the one collection my library has on hand, so it became my introduction to Pico!

This is not humor writing like anything you are going to find at the humor table at Barnes & Noble, but Pico's sense of humor is certainly strong throughout, despite the fact that this is basically a breakup book. It's that dark humor that is indigenous humor, queer humor: "How do we protect ourselves from car commercials and the border patrol."

The theme of the book is junk. Junk food, junk shops, men's junk (as in anatomy) and men's junk (as in unexamined racism, toxic behaviors, etc.), like dumped. The whole book is one long poem, without punctuation other show more than commas, apostrophes, and the occasional quotation mark, with line ends that are structural rather than the end of a thought or a breath. When it worked for me, it gave the writing a propulsive stream of consciousness that really fit his style well. When it didn't work for me (especially when I tried to read this while I was sick), I quickly got frustrated trying to parse where one thought or phrase ended and the next began, going back and rereading over and over.

I liked it (especially when not sick), but I have a number of friends here looking to get into poetry or dip back into poetry looking for work that is "accessible," and if accessibility of form is what you mean, this may not be that. But if it's the content and references you mean, this is VERY accessible/relatable, returning over and over to defend Janet Jackson and expand on Pico's love of junk food. "I'm the opposite of a foodie, I'm like a junkie" or "How the fuck do ppl still have energy for sweaty sexytimes after midnight He wants to go again and I want to go home, have an indica chamomile and slack like a boss" show less

“Tommy Pico brings his unique personal perspective to this volume. He explores, once again, what it is to be Native American and gay in the United States at that weird moment in history prior to the pandemic.”

https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-review/junk

We don't say "boysenberry" enough, as a species

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And the whole block knows / when I stub my toe It sounds like this: UUUUUUGGGGGHHH

I am in PHYSICAL PAIN.

absolutely outstanding poem by a poet whose voice I cherish as much as any other!!