Introduction for the book Come-on from the Horse on 7th Avenue: Poems by David Clink 2002
David Clink is a poet of many voices, and in my not-nearly-humble-enough opinion, he is a genius. He has a sense of humor dry enough to whither cactus and the greatest deadpan delivery I have ever seen. But his genius is that he doesn’t feel compelled to stay funny. All around him he sees biting humor and heartbreaking sadness mixed together in swirls of an emotional sundae. He chronicles these swirls and contrasts with brilliance and empathy, with sweetness and nuts.
There is another dichotomy in David’s work: the spoken versus printed. As a featured reader David Clink is a performance artist who imbues his poetry with energy, sensitivity, wit, clarity, and stomach-aching laughter. Then he is left with the unenviable task of trying to capture all of that in black and white. That he so often succeeds is another sign of his genius.
In this collection David’s manic energy is perhaps most obvious in “Death Plays a Fiddle.” David has taken exceptionally strong images for the ingredients of his emotional sundae, but instead of gently mixing them in a parfait glass, he has thrown them in the blender and pressed puree. The result is breathtaking.
I don’t know which poem will cause you to laugh out loud against your will; humors vary. But I know that one poem will leave you reeling, and one will make you stare thoughtfully into space, and one will provoke a trip through memory.
David Clink’s four voices, funny, sad, spoken, written, all come together in “The Rutabaga Poet,” a poem full of awful puns best heard out loud, smoldering sexuality, sorrow, and the ambience of a poetry reading. It allows the reader to compare David’s view of pastoral themes and compare them to, well, The Rutabaga Poet.
If you know David, or have at least read extensively from his work, you are not surprised that this collection of pastoral poems refuses to stay in the country. In fact, it ends by taking the reader on a trip around the world. I hope you enjoy the journey. And I hope you hear David read his poetry in person; it will change forever how you read his printed work.
Herb Kauderer
Lancaster, New York
September 6, 2002
There is another dichotomy in David’s work: the spoken versus printed. As a featured reader David Clink is a performance artist who imbues his poetry with energy, sensitivity, wit, clarity, and stomach-aching laughter. Then he is left with the unenviable task of trying to capture all of that in black and white. That he so often succeeds is another sign of his genius.
In this collection David’s manic energy is perhaps most obvious in “Death Plays a Fiddle.” David has taken exceptionally strong images for the ingredients of his emotional sundae, but instead of gently mixing them in a parfait glass, he has thrown them in the blender and pressed puree. The result is breathtaking.
I don’t know which poem will cause you to laugh out loud against your will; humors vary. But I know that one poem will leave you reeling, and one will make you stare thoughtfully into space, and one will provoke a trip through memory.
David Clink’s four voices, funny, sad, spoken, written, all come together in “The Rutabaga Poet,” a poem full of awful puns best heard out loud, smoldering sexuality, sorrow, and the ambience of a poetry reading. It allows the reader to compare David’s view of pastoral themes and compare them to, well, The Rutabaga Poet.
If you know David, or have at least read extensively from his work, you are not surprised that this collection of pastoral poems refuses to stay in the country. In fact, it ends by taking the reader on a trip around the world. I hope you enjoy the journey. And I hope you hear David read his poetry in person; it will change forever how you read his printed work.
Herb Kauderer
Lancaster, New York
September 6, 2002