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The Dickmans' Bedside Tables
Near the end of yesterday's show with the poets Matthew and Michael Dickman, we got a call from Gerhard in Portland. He told us he's a fraternal twin — "Go twins!" interjected the brothers — and asked what poets the Dickmans are reading these days.
Michael said that this past week he's been reading Mark Strand and Jean Valentine, "both wonderful and wonderfully strange poets in their image and the kinds of stories they tell."
And he's been going back to Philip Levine, who writes "stunning narrative poems that are like stories with these lyric explosions about working class people and working class ideals."
Matthew said he's just stumbled upon a poet "who's been around, apparently, forever," named Kazuko Shiraishi. And he's been re-reading work from his acquaintance and fellow Portland poet Zachary Schomburg: "His poems are beautiful. I've been reading The Man Suit again. It's so great to have next to your bed."
