Maxwell Baumbach's Suburban Rhythm (Book Review) by David McLean

This is a brief review to draw the reader's attention to a new e-chapbook by poet Maxwell Baumbach that is available at the scars.tv website.

Baumbach's work is refreshing since he has a very sharp eye for how he himself, other people, and the social confusion that is modern life, work. He writes precisely and accurately, with a modern understatement tinged with regret:

if people
love you
that
is wonderful

and

if people
hate you
that
is even better

but

if people
nothing you
that
is when you are without purpose

He knows how relationships are and how they leave us fulfilled and unfulfilled, and why, and, as an honest man, can't offer a way out.

the people
I know
are flawed
but
that politician
on TV
seems
like
a nice guy

The title says it all, it's about the suburban middle-class mediocre life on offer to us all, everywhere. Excellent work and free to read too, at the link above, check it out.

there are
jungle gyms
drenched in lighter fluid
next to
swimming pools of fire
thumbtack covered
monkey bars
attached to
razor blade slides
and
stove-top tire swings
above shark infested waters

this is one
beautiful playground
we have given our children

You may access the book here: Suburban Rhythm

Author bio:

David McLean is Welsh but has lived in Sweden since 1987. He lives there on an island in a large lake called Mälaren, very near to Stockholm, with woman, cats, and a couple of large black and tan dogs. He is an atheist, an anarchist and generally disgusting. He has a BA in History from Balliol, Oxford, and an MA in philosophy, taken much later and much more seriously studied for, from Stockholm. Up to date details of well over a thousand poems in various zines - both print and online, both degenerate and reputable - over the last three years or so are at his blog at Mourning Abortion. There you will also find details of several currently available books and chapbooks - including three print full lengths, four print chapbooks, and a free electronic chapbook.