This, the first full-length poetry collection by Kurt Luchs (author of It's Funny Until Someone Loses an Eye), contains enough references to the present moment to signal that it was written in this century, but otherwise it seems almost a book from a different era, specifically, that of the innovative American poetry of the sixties and seventies. The author has clearly been inspired by the free verse of Robert Bly, W.S. Merwin, James Tate and Charles Simic, among others. However, his voice remains very much his own: lyrical, direct, mysterious, funny and awestruck by turns, often in the same poem. There is nothing trendy or up-to-date about these poems, which may be why so many of them feel both fresh and timeless. He divides the book into four sections forming a loose sort of arc. The opening section, Feral Grief, recounts a brutal and loveless childhood endured with his siblings, a dark tale he tells without self-pity and with flashes of savage humor and grace. One of these poems, Suzie, about a memorably awful family dog, won the 2019 Atlanta Review International Poetry Contest. The second part, Night and Morning, shifts the mood into the light with closely observed nature lyrics and meditations. Section three, The Sound of Water, appears to be a catch-all housing the surreal, the satirical and the spiritual, a kind of literary thrift store window where a comic swipe at the false promise of shampoo-conditioner sits comfortably next to a heartfelt tribute to J.S. Bach. He concludes with a powerful section that shares its crookedly optimistic title with the book itself, Falling in the Direction of Up. These are striking love poems that range from joyful to mournful to sensual to bemused-again, sometimes all at once-sharply written and revealing the redemptive power of the human spirit. Taken together, these accomplished verses read less like a first book than like the work of a poet writing at the height of his powers, what James Wright called the poetry of a grown man.

About the Author

Kurt Luchs was born in Cheektowaga, New York, grew up in Wheaton, Illinois, and has lived and worked all over the United States. After years of writing humor for the New Yorker, the Onion and McSweeney's Internet Tendency, among others, he returned to his first love, poetry, like a wounded animal crawling into its burrow to die. His most recent work includes FALLING IN THE DIRECTION OF UP (Sagging Meniscus Press, 2021). In 2017 Sagging Meniscus Press published his humor collection, IT'S FUNNY UNTIL SOMEONE LOSSES AN EYE (THEN IT'S REALLY FUNNY), which has since become an international non-bestseller. In 2019 his poetry chapbook One of These Things Is Not Like the Other was published by Finishing Line Press, and he won the Atlanta Review International Poetry Contest, proving that dreams can still come true and clerical errors can still happen.

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