Closing the Hotel Kitchen

I've never read anything like this: part fiction, part chronicle, a book length poem-the narrator's voice that of a generation "in search of a form that might give it meaning." These astounding poems gain their momentum from an accumulation of unresolved images from his childhood, the denied past and the wars of his youth (WW2, the Cold War, Vietnam)---all this a prelude to what's coming, the relentless, violent betrayals and lies of a society and government that changed us permanently into "adults," disconnected from what we once wanted and thought and believed. Bohm's stunning language and brilliant poetics are a match for this vision. The impetus here is nothing less than to be a midwife of this necessary birth. This is a guide to a whole new way to write.---Sharon Doubiago, author of Hard Country, Love on the Streets, My Father's Love

What's always struck me most about Robert Bohm is that he thinks about poetry. Not just about what he's trying to express---although he does that with aplomb---but what the poem is, where it lives, what it does in the world. He doesn't just give us a memoir with line breaks, he gives us the past's doorknobs, signals and core. Fine poets are more common than most give credit for, and thank goodness for that, but poetry's great thinkers are much rarer, which makes Bohm's work so incredibly vital.---Victor D. Infante, author of City of Insomnia

Bohm's Closing the Hotel Kitchen is full of a quiet anger that burns like white phosphorus. There is no turning away from these poems and no forgiveness. They relentlessly catch us off guard and the voices hold us---tugging at our sleeves and forcing us to see their awful truths. These are essential poems of our moment.---Gerald McCarthy, author of Trouble Light