Open Book is celebrating National Poetry Month with daily profiles of today's "unacknowledged legislators of the world." Find out what inspires, confounds and delights the poets behind this spring's new releases by following our series.
Whether you're a long-time fan of Stan Rogal or new to his work, you'll delight in the collection Dance Monster! (Insomniac Press), which brings together 50 of Rogal's best poems from the past 30 years. The poems find inspiration in sources as diverse as folksong, linguistics, chaos theory and sexuality. According to Don McKay, it's as if "Rogal had snuck up on a whole regiment of stock cultural myths and assumptions, armed only with a folksong, imaginative muscle, abundant mother wit and a wicked talent for subversive wordplay: it's the surprise that enlivens; the trickster's art."
