Go Ahead: Judge My Book By Its Cover!

It's been a busy month here at The Little Office. The last couple of weeks while we/I were supposedly on vacation with the in-laws, auntie, uncle, and cousins/nieces, I was steadfastly checking out dozens of collage artists' websites. I had no idea how many of them were out there! After a week of diligently sneaking every free minute possible to search cyberspace high and low, I came across a collaged image on an old-fashioned playing card by one Felicia Piacentino. When I saw it, I let out a gasp. Why? Because "Planetary" pleasingly and perfectly presents the three main subjects of my book: the trifecta of cosmic wonder, baby-making/rearing, and spirits/saints/gods/goddesses. I was so happy to finally find a work of art that really says: go ahead, judge this book by its cover, cuz you're about to read poems that deal with all three, sometimes all at once.



But of course you also want to see a few of the runner's up, right? Of course you do!



Send Me An Angel

This one is by Peter Lewis, a collagist near and dear to my heart. So funny! But a little too bonkers for my somewhat/at times serious book.

And "Reach Out to the Stars," another by Peter Lewis, which it turns out was featured in a show called "Gravy," which happens to be the title of the penultimate poem in The Little Office--but alas, there aren't quite enough aliens in my book to warrant this:




And then there was Marty Gordon's work . . .


Got A Light

This image I also loved, but again, just a tad too kooky for the gravitas aspect of this collection. I also loved:


Vacuuming on Moon

I also liked this one by Edith Vonnegut, but it was a tad on the busy side, and perhaps contained a few too many female figures:


Story of My Life

Finally, Lou Beach's "Collage with Key and Door and Eye"





There were a few others, but these were the ones I kept going back to over and over.

Once I chose Piacentino's "Planetary," I contacted her (fingers crossed) to see if she would let me use a digitized image of her fine work x 1,000. What a relief when she said yes! I also purchased the original art work (playing-card sized) to frame and treasure for eternity.

Thanks, Felicia, for agreeing to let me use your work, and to Henry Israeli, my editor at Saturnalia, for being patient and helpful with suggestions and advice as I conducted my World Wide Webby search.

Now onto the final editing of the manuscript . . .