Amazon www.jerryratch.com Jerry Ratch Category:  Poetry Publisher: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. ISBN-10:  0810815117 Type: Non-Fiction Pages: 185 Copyright: 1982 Selected Poems through 1982 Poems from the following books: Puppet X Clown Birth Osiris Helen Chaucer Marginalia yCantos Excerpt "I'm not a practising angel, ladies and gentlemen." -- from: Puppet X

Contact II

from a review in Contact II by Robin Kay Willoughby:

"Ratch is a poet the way David Bowie is a musician: it's obvious that Ratch's text resembles Bowie's lyrics (e.g.: "...an airplane, a very high,/ serious airplane," ..."rainy mouse/ in the year 3000/ after the logical wars"), but less obvious how they both continuously reveal the terror in their business. Far from "parsimonious," Ratch is most lavish with the richness of his lean poems - the few words per piece that he hands us are so intellectually and spiritually nourishing! - satisfying and shocking at once, like brown rice with a salt-plum on the side, as in this, from "Osiris":

so it was
the soul that was
called back

in that sudden
beating of wings

said Run
but my heart
was not there

said Run
but my heart was
in the way