“McIntosh's imagination is so vivid that the primary response to [his poetry] is delight.” —American Book Review
Sandy McIntosh: Forty-Nine Guaranteed Ways to Escape Death

Sandy McIntosh’s poems are incisive, clever, sometimes cynical, sometimes political, but above all, comic. As the reviewer, I got my copy of Forty-Nine Ways as a freebie. (Eat your heart out.) But I would gladly pay money for it. In the interest of stimulating the economy, you should buy this book. —Rebecca Spears, Sentence 6

In this new collection Sandy McIntosh ventures further into the realms of imaginative invention, returning with diverse arrangements of weird musical instruments and catalogs of improbable events. In a seemingly simple postmodern gesture, McIntosh makes what in most people’s hands would-be gimmicks into writing that is truly heartfelt, genuine and intriguingly strange. A number of writers and poets might come to mind when reading Forty-Nine Guaranteed Ways to Escape Death as well as McIntosh’s earlier work—Borges, Auster, Collins—but no one else has so amusingly plumbed our unconscious and the melding of dream and “reality” as has McIntosh; his forays into experience are painful at times, hilariously bizarre, always poignant as well as provocative, and unique in their formal qualities. His is a Möbius strip world in which we become aware of our primal fears and wishes through the oddnesses of an everyday consciousness tinged with ironic goofiness.

Sandy McIntosh’s gift of exploring the “what if” moments of life is most evident in his new vivacious collection Forty-Nine Guaranteed Ways To Escape Death. McIntosh spins a tantalizing web of tales—unlikely encounters with the famous; musical instruments invented not to be easily played, but rather to be beautiful objects themselves; and mega-lists, one of which is the sublime title poem. Constantly inventive, his poems are meta in their metamorphosis—one prose poem even becomes a review of his last book. He mythologizes terrorist threats and re-imagines The Man of Steel. His poems are indeed reminiscent of Superman, zooming into Metropolis to scoop up Poetry and save it from the villains, Boredom and Pretense. —Denise Duhamel

Praise for The After-Death History of My Mother

Sandy McIntosh's entertaining new volume might be mistaken, at first, for a merry romp through personal and literary history conducted by a slightly confused, well-meaning people-pleaser. His confusion begins with his bemused revelation that he has (maybe) two mothers, and continues through various other doublings (dream transformations, reincarnations, literary 'forgeries,' literary mothers both male and female, poems masquerading as prose and vice versa) to a final doubling (double-crossing) that brings with it a 'broade [sic] awaking' to reality.... This is a book of elegies—eulogies, really—to all the literal and literary bastards who have made McIntosh an artist and (maybe) a con. —Laural Blossom, American Book Review

“As the title suggests, the poet’s quest is familial, but it is also poetic. In a way, the poetic mentors McIntosh invokes (such as Allen Ginsberg and David Ignatow) are like fathers, or at least older brothers, to him. A sort of detective, McIntosh uses whatever tools are available to shed light on his family and poetic pasts.... The innovation of this work is most apparent when McIntosh combines as many methods as possible into one piece.”—Erica Wright, ForeWord

"Obsessional," a long poem in parts, comprises the final section.... Throughout "Obsessional," the speaker's work serves as an additional focal point: a literary scandal in 1559 surrounding Cambridge scholar Nicholas Grimald, London Printer Richard Tottel and the publication of Songs and Sonnets.... Intriguing and entertaining enough that it would make an excellent film. —Rebecca Spears, Sentence

The showcase piece of this book, a long sequence titled “Obsessional,” is remarkable for yoking an engaging Elizabethan literary detective story to a personal narrative about life as a grad school poet. Even more impressive than this set-up actually succeeding is the way McIntosh is able to tie compassion to dagger-thrust humor. If that’s what “obsessional” poetry is—personal narrative of neurosis that is aware a world exists outside the poet’s gut, and is not afraid to tell a joke—maybe it will catch on among those still in the stranglehold of the confessional. The ending sequence is balanced at the front of the book by the title sequence, composed of memorial lyrics and anecdotes in prose and free verse, at once touching and chilling. With pieces about David Ignatow, Allen Ginsberg, and H. R. Hayes the book leaves a haunting lasting impression, like the poet’s mother in “The Hospital Chair”—“She touches you and tells you you are healed/ and may go home,” but also warns “No one knows what will happen/ when I leave my tomb in the night/ to touch you.” —Brian Clements, Boog City

Sandy McIntosh’s The After-Death History of My Mother is whimsical, sharp, humorous and clever. It’s multi-hued content reflected in the multicoloured joyful painting of its cover. The joi de vie of the art is a shocking contrast to the stark declaration of death made by the title. This juxtaposition continues through the book with poems sectioned into moments of contrast to those before and after them. It seems to dare the reader to follow the thread of McIntosh’s thought, to try to keep pace with what at one moment is funereal slow and the next as fast as the night creature avoiding the glare of a porch light.... McIntosh’s ability to skip a whimsied path between prose and poetry is one of the most enduring factors of this book. He feels no need to confine himself to one style within a poem; occasionally he brings in drama as well. Perhaps in his next collection he will add lyrics and a news report, and the one after that can bring in a thesis and biblical sermon. I wouldn’t underestimate anything about this poet. He is a wild card, and they are often the best to read and follow. The After-Death History of My Mother is an energetic book. The reader is dazzled, bemused and caught unawares by the way McIntosh approaches his subject. A surreal book for a surreal today!—Fionna Doney Simmonds, Galatea Ressurects


Sandy McIntosh’s collections of poetry include The After Death History of My Mother, Between Earth and Sky (Marsh Hawk Press), Endless Staircase (Street Press), Earth Works (Long Island University), Which Way to the Egress? (Garfield Publishers), and two chapbooks: Obsessional (Tamafyhr Mountain Poetry) and Monsters of the Antipodes (Survivors Manual Books). His prose includes Firing Back, with Jodie-Beth Galos (John Wiley & Sons), From A Chinese Kitchen (American Cooking Guild), and The Poets In the Poets-In-The-Schools (Minnesota Center for Social Research, University of Minnesota. His poetry and essays have been published in The New York Times, Newsday, The Nation, the Wall Street Journal, American Book Review, and elsewhere. His original poetry in a film script won the Silver Medal in the Film Festival of the Americas.

ISBN-13: 978-0-9792416-1-1 (pbk.)
ISBN-10: 0-9792416-1-8 (pbk.)
$15.00

 

At the Funeral Home Bar

This funeral home is impressive, shiny new, vast as a convention hall, coffins and mourners everywhere crowding the horizon. Over there, the dancing Hassidim; yonder, the phlegmatic Peloponnesians. Every religion, every class is accommodated. But I’m here on business. I roll my mother’s wheelchair toward a couple of idle morticians. “Could you watch her for a moment?” I ask. “I’ve got to meet someone at the bar.” “Certainly,” they answer. I can tell they’re about to give me that creepy mortician smile that says: You don’t know what we know about what happens next. However, I don’t have time to humor them. I’ve got business at the funeral home bar—

— which turns out to be a lovely place, warmly lit and crowded with genuine, friendly folk. No rude barroom jocularity here. Indeed, they make quiet, respectful jokes. Occasionally one will place a comforting hand on another’s shoulder.

I’ve come here to meet my friend, but time passes and she never shows up. “Your friend is late? Get it? She’s your late friend?” says the gentleman next to me. I laugh politely. “Don’t worry,” he says. “Sooner or later she’ll show up. They always do.”

But she doesn’t, so I decide to head home. Once off the barstool and onto the floor, I realize that everyone here is extremely tall. Even I seem to be taller than when I came in. “Mourning will do that to you,” says the gentleman next to me. “Sadness does it. Let me show you,” and he makes a sweeping gesture with his hand. The scene is transformed. We’re no longer affable people at a funeral home bar but tall pine trees in a forest. It is winter. The air is clear, cold. And though we stand together, each of us is somber and alone.