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Giving the Stars Their Right Names: Don’t Call Us Dead by Danez Smith, reviewed

Z.G. Tomaszewski

Don't Call Us Dead - Danez Smith

Don’t Call Us Dead by Danez Smith / Graywolf Press / 96 pages / 978-1555977856 / September 5, 2017 Not all poems are written and speak out in defense of something, not many books reach up and over … [Read more...]

Book review – Life is Unbearable: Grzegorz Wróblewski’s Zero Visibility

Marcus Slease

Zero Visibility by Grzegorz Wróblewski

Zero Visibility by Grzegorz Wróblewski (trans. Piotr Gwiazda) / Phoneme Media / 136 pages / ISBN: 978-1944700126 We are constantly swamped with all sorts of products (books, music, movies, the … [Read more...]

Heroin Haikus by William Wantling, reviewed

Denise Enck

William Wantling Heroin Haikus

Heroin Haikus by William Wantling / Tangerine Press / 2016 / 20 pages / 978-1-910691-18-2 William Wantling's Heroin Haikus, out of print for fifty years, was recently published in a new edition by … [Read more...]

Book Review – In Whatever Light Left to Us by Jessica Jacobs

Carolyn Ogburn

In Whatever Light Left to Us by Jessica Jacobs, poetry

In Whatever Light Left To Us by Jessica Jacobs / Sibling Rivalry Press / ISBN: 978-1-943977-19-2 / 44 pages / 2016 Jessica Jacob’s In Whatever Light Left to Us, is a chapbook infused with the … [Read more...]

Book review – Modern Once Again: Whit Griffin’s We Who Saw Everything

Christopher Rizzo

We Who Saw Everything by Whit Griffin

We Who Saw Everything by Whit Griffin / The Cutural Society / 978-0-988-71926-2 /2015 It’s said that the Roman statesman Cassiodorus was the first writer to regularly use “modern” in the … [Read more...]

Sonosyntactics by Paul Dutton: A Book Review

Michael Lindgren

Sonosyntactics: Selected and New Poetry of Paul Dutton

Sonosyntactics by Paul Dutton / Wilfrid Laurier University Press / $18.99 / 2015 Sonosyntactics: Selected and New Poetry of Paul Dutton serves as a tidy overview of the work of an unheralded poet … [Read more...]

Book Review — Brownian Life by John Tischer

Neil Leadbeater

John Tischer - Brownian Life - Poetry

Brownian Life by John Tischer / Bibliotheca Universalis / Bucharest, Romania / 2015 John Tischer was born in Chicago. He graduated from Carleton College in 1971 and was a student of Chögyam … [Read more...]

Book Review – Bad Baby by Abigail Welhouse

Michael Lindgren

Bad Baby - Poetry by Abigail Welhouse

Bad Baby by Abigail Welhouse / Dancing Girl Press / $7 / 2015 This spiky-funny little book of poems is by a young Brooklyn-based poet named Abigail Welhouse, via a charming Chicago-based chapbook … [Read more...]

beyond the ghosts: poems by t. kilgore splake

Denise Enck

Beyond the Ghosts: Poetry by t. kilgore splake

beyond the ghosts: poems by t. kilgore splake / Presa Press / PO Box 792, Rockford MI 49341 / 35 pages / $6.00 The author provided a copy to Empty Mirror, with no expectation of review. t. … [Read more...]

Book Review — Grand Marais by t. kilgore splake

Denise Enck

photo pf Grand Marais

Grand Marais by t. kilgore splake / paperback, with DVD / 978-1-4675-8222-3 t. kilgore splake's latest volume is a poetic and photographic celebration of Grand Marais, Minnesota, a small city … [Read more...]

splake’s Magic Box

Bruce Hodder

splake fishing in america. Rockford: Presa Press, 2013 only in my dreams. Springfield: Gage, 2012. Beyond Campfire Ashes. Battle Creeek: Gage, 2012. Backwater Bard Loft Musings. Fort Wayne: The … [Read more...]

Book Review – Michael Rothenberg’s poetry collection, Unhurried Vision

Hammond Guthrie

Unhurried Vision - Michael Rothenberg

Unhurried Vision La Alameda Press, Alburquerque, NM, 2004 Unhurried Vision, and in this manner so it reads, from one new year to the next scribing a journal of living (1999) poetically in the … [Read more...]

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Empty Mirror

Established in 2000 and edited by Denise Enck, Empty Mirror is an online literary magazine that publishes new work each Friday.

Each week EM features several poems each by one or two poets; reviews; critical essays; visual art; and personal essays.

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