LESS FORTUNATE PIRATES

Death strips us of the bullshit.
It is life that brings it back.

 Poems from the First Year
Without My Father

 

Alexander (b. 1756, North Carolina)
son of Archibald
John (b. 1785, North Carolina)
son of Alexander
Quintillion (b. 1814, Georgia)
son of John
James (b. 1856, Alabama)
son of Quintillion
Cullen (b. 1886, Arkansas)
son of James
Hilburn (b. 1920, Arkansas)
son of Cullen
Jimmy (b. 1948, Arkansas)
son of Hilburn
Bryan (b. 1979, Arkansas)
son of Jimmy.
With no son, Father, I give to you,
to all of you,
this book. 

On December 20, 2009, Bryan Borland’s father was killed when his vehicle left a one-lane bridge and plunged into a lake. These are poems from the year that followed.

Ian Young, Founder of Catalyst Press and Editor of The Male Muse:

“Bryan Borland’s Less Fortunate Pirates is one of the most moving and eloquent explorations of the devestations and epiphanies of filial loss since James Agee’s 1950′s classic A Death in the Family.”

Alice Shaprio, Poet Laureate of Douglasville, Georgia, and the author of Saltian:

“Less Fortunate Pirates begins in truth, ends in truth, and through occasional dream imagery, mysteriously bridges our emotional reactions to death with reality. All of us experience death whether of the body or in transformative life situations. Less Fortunate Pirates, with its flawless transition from one state of consciousness to another, with its rhythmic undulations of phrasing, with its unique and satisfying metaphoric switches, builds a range of emotions that is moving, buoys us through the natural healing process and reveals the beauty in all phases of the human condition. Bryan Borland has given us a seamless read and pure celebration. “

COMING NOVEMBER 13, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937420-24-6