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Swollening
Swollening | Jason Purcell
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Jason Purcell’s debut collection of poems rests at the intersection of queerness and illness, staking a place for the queer body that has been made sick through living in this world. Part poetic experiment and part memoir, Swollening attempts to diagnose what has been undiagnosable, tracing an uneven path from a lifetime of swallowing bad feelings—homophobia in its external and internalized manifestations, heteronormativity, anxiety surrounding desire, aversion to sex—to a body in revolt. In poems that speak using the grammar and logics of sickness, Purcell offers a dizzying collision of word and image that is the language of pain alongside the banality of living on. Beginning by reading his own life and body closely and slowly zooming out to read illness in the world, Purcell comes to ask: how might a sick, queer body forgive itself for a natural reaction to living in a sick world and go on toward hope? In Swollening, Purcell coughs up his own poetics of illness, his own aesthetics of pain, to form a tender collection that lands straight in the gut.
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CaseyTheCanadianLesbrarian
Swollening | Jason Purcell
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Jason Purcell's debut poetry collection is full of the sick, queer body as a material reality. "Sickness," they write, "is not a metaphor." The poems are also about nonbinary gender, Alberta masculinity, surviving these end days we find ourselves in, and more. I wrote a full review on my blog!
https://caseythecanadianlesbrarian.wordpress.com/2022/06/26/queer-bodies-and-ill...

Lindy Nice review. I was surprised by how much I liked this, even though the title and cover put me off a bit. 2y
CaseyTheCanadianLesbrarian @Lindy thanks Lindy! Yes I think the cover image in particular has a strong abject, body horror almost feel, I think probably on purpose? 2y
Lindy @CaseyTheCanadianLesbrarian I agree with your assessment of the cover. 🦷🧟 2y
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Lindy
Swollening | Jason Purcell
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This is the first full collection of poetry by Jason Purcell, nonbinary co-owner of Edmonton‘s Glass Bookshop. The book is divided into 3: the 1st section is about youth, growing up swallowing (internalizing) homophobia; the 2nd is about real & metaphorical illness (dental work too!); and the 3rd section is about healing. The poems in the last section are my favourite, filled with hope & wisdom accrued through living. #Canadian #LGBTQ

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Lindy
Swollening | Jason Purcell
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One can only pull one‘s own tooth out if it is very loose.

You can wait for this to happen naturally (common in the very young and very old), or you can use force.

You can pull your own truth from yourself, but what to do with all the extra blood?

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