Heehee by Juliet Gelfman-Randazzo

“She’s almost like a skater. Her poems are like skate videos.”

In Heehee, Juliet Gelfman-Randazzo’s poems refuse to stop having fun. The poems refuse to go home. The poems go to the second location, and the third. The poems refuse to stop talking, which is of course a form of having fun. Actually, talking is singing in the language world of Heehee. And of course, you should never stop singing. Where any reasonable poet would end a poem, Juliet sends the figures in her poem out for pasta, ostensibly to continue talking and laughing (which, remember, is singing) long into the night. I’m so happy this book is finally here. And that it won’t stop talking.

She turns words over “writing about a lack, writing with alacrity” to get speed and torque. She’s almost like a skater. Her poems are like skate videos. I love watching her mind work, exhaust itself, get a second wind, and go somewhere even crazier on the fumes.