Scar to Scar (chapbook)

$9.90

Scar to Scar is an evocative collaborative work in which poet Michele Seminara responds to the work of Robbie Coburn, finding new texts within his poems.

The book was conceived when Robbie sent Michele a poem and she replied, in kind, with a poem ‘found’ within his, re-ordering his original text as a form of poetic alchemy.

Initially begun as a means of extracting light from what were often troubling topics, the poems use the same language to create entirely different ‘counter’ pictures. The collaboration soon developed into a way of exploring the connection between the two poets, as well as their individual and shared connections to language and expression.

You can purchase Scar to Scar directly from PressPress. You can read a review of the chapbook on Rochford Street Review.

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Description

Scar to Scar

A6 32pp ISBN 978-0-9873057-6-3

Buy direct from PressPress for $9.90 (including postage).

To whet your appetite further, here are the original pair of poems which started it all…

Scars

Robbie Coburn

within landscapes
sealed off   and positioning the body
you watch the breath enter the stilled atmosphere.
along the blade    poised
against your palm
where blood begins to run,
the framed nature of panic
is forgotten.
the wound is only preservation, remember.
when the skin begins to fail
blood draped along the decayed bone-lines
a pulse will run along the nerve ends.
you corner the vein and drive the object in again
finding a point of collapse —
with the same impulse the passage will lead you back.
for a while the red painted on your arm
feels distant
your body does not belong to you.
in this   there is
permanence.

Counter Scars

Michele Seminara 

the cry of my voice is enough
to collapse skin.
becoming survival
you cross    a passage
preservation wounds
forgotten.
the panic of blood
against blade along poised palm
stills.
my breath enters
your sealed
landscapes
within.