The most comprehensive collection of John Bennett's Shards to date. 317 pages. Major.

ISBN: 978-0-9776783-7-2

(Also available in e-book format for $9.00 from Metropolis/Outlaw Poetry. Use the following link and scroll to the bottom of the page for e-book ordering information. http://m-etropolis.com/blog/john-bennett-the-book-of-shards-hcolom-press/ )

Price: $16.00
Place Order

Pithy, abbreviated Shards with walloping punch lines, almost like bumper stickers.

ISBN: 978-0-9776783-9-6

(Also available in e-book format for $9.00 from Metropolis/Outlaw Poetry. Use the following link and scroll to the bottom of the page for e-book ordering information.  http://m-etropolis.com/blog/john-bennett-short-jabs-hcolom-press/ )

Price: $10.00
Place Order

From Lummox Press, Bennett's most comprehensive collection of Shards to date. 137 pages of dynamite.

"Sometimes I wonder about all the imagery that goes skedaddling through my head each day, but your mind is like Grand Central Station in comparison."

ISBN:978-1-929878-09-3 (paper)

(Also available in e-book format for $9.00 from Metropolis/Outlaw Poetry. Use the following link and scroll to the bottom of the page for e-book ordering information. http://m-etropolis.com/blog/john-bennett-drive-by-shards-poems-lummox-press-e-book/ )

Price: $15.00
Place Order

Shards.  Winner of Mystery Island's "Poetry Idol" competition.

APACHE WARRIORS, I SALUTE YOU

So this is what a last stand feels like. The realization that the Beast cannot be killed.

In Vietnam, monk after monk sat in the lotus position and set himself on fire. Henry Cabot Lodge dismissed them as sensationalists. He also said it was interesting, sipping brandy behind his mahogany desk in the embassy, to hear gun fire on the streets of Saigon. Such are our ambassadors, be they American, French, Japanese or German. I spit on this sit-com TV world, from the top down to the bottom.

Geronimo came out of the mountains only after they'd shipped his people off to Florida like Jews in box cars. But there were others who did not come down. They rode into the purple mist. They are there to this day. 

Apache warriors, I salute you.

Price: $10.00
Place Order

A new collection of Shards from Pudding House Press, the same press that published Bennett's first book of Shards in 1996.

from Tying a Windsor:

"...My father died the same day as Ken Kesey. I flew east for the funeral. They dressed me up in his clothes. I stood in front of the mirror in his slacks and silk shirt and prepared to make a knot in his tie. I thought it would be easy, like riding a bike, even after decades you just get on and go. But I could no longer do it, and after five minutes I gave up and walked down the hall to the kitchen. My father's second wife had just put toast in the toaster.

'This thing either burns the toast or brings it up too light,' she said. 'I was after him for almost a year to fix it, but you know your -- 'She was interrupted by the toast popping out of the toaster a good foot into the air and falling to the floor.

We laughed so hard we had tears in our eyes. We laughed until our jaws ached, and then my father's new wife began crying.

Embarrassed, I looked down, and there on the floor lay the toast -- unbuttered and golden..."

ISBN: 1-58998-592-3

Price: $10.00
Place Order

THE THEORY OF CREATION, John Bennett: part of a 2005 trilogy of Shards, the other two volumes being The Birth of Road Rage and War All the Time.

From "Existence is the Original Sin": "Absolutes are not accessible thru the senses. All sensory experience is a vicarious thrill. Ratchet your learning beyond the threshold of fear, and when the bolts begin to pop and an entire ocean rushes thru a pinhole, then it will happen. Something quite unimaginable that you knew all along."

Price: $9.00
Place Order

THE BIRTH OF ROAD RAGE, John Bennett: part of a 2005 trilogy of Shards, the other two volumes being The Theory of Creation and War All the Time.

From "Howard Hughes Has Nine-inch Nails": "Howard Hughes has 9-inch nails. That's him huddled far down the beach. He has gray hair that swirls like spun silk thru his rib cage. He has a cash box in the trunk of his car. He has a plane made of wood and a heart made of stone. He turns into the wind. We're both beyond needing people. We're both beyond help. I light a cigarette in cupped hands and watch him slip into the trees."

Price: $9.00
Place Order

WAR ALL THE TIME, John Bennett: part of a 2005 trilogy of Shards, the other two volumes being The Birth of Road Rage and The Theory of Creation.

From "The Desert Storm of My Mind": "I'm trying hard here to keep it simple, to translate the desert storm of my mind into sandbox terminology, a world with make-believe picket fences and aborted dreams dressed like rag dolls--a gas-guzzling, talk-show fiasco, an election-year, here-comes-Christmas existence..."

Price: $9.00
Place Order

Contains precursor Shard writing as well as three stories that are among the best Bennett has ever written. A sleeper that one day will be a collector's item.

ISBN: 0-912292-94-6

Price: $10.95
Place Order

Dark-side love poems.

"Betrayal's Like That ought to be required reading for sex education classes in high school."
Doug Martensen, prospector

"There are some images in Betrayal's Like That that are so sharp and real, I don't have the words to comment on them."

Glenn Starry, stock investor
Tallahassee, FL.

"Betrayal's Like That is killer. I'm so impressed with this book that if you order it and you don't agree with me, I'll send you whatever you feel you overpaid."

Joe Grant, "Lit Happens"
WORT-FM
Madison, WI.

ISBN: 0-912824-41-7

Price: $10.00
Place Order

FIRE IN THE HOLE: "Bennett is seldom, if ever, compared with another writer, which is a high compliment. After reading Fire in the Hole, if I were to compare Bennett with another poet, it would have to be Kenneth Patchen."

William Chadwick
Cross Purpose Review

ISBN: 1-887641-57-2

Price: $8.00
Place Order