Last Call at the Tin Palace,
(click here to see the publisher's web page)
poems by Paul Pines
ART OF MEMORY
— for Hilton Ruiz
Driving from the airport
to New Orleans
on a May evening
the silence that comes
after so many notes
light suspended
in the southern sky
like fire in a river
mind reflecting on
itself the unheard
music of dusk melting
into jungle from which
a single chord is struck
somewhere
a freighter slips
coastwise
from the delta
into the Gulf
Reviews
Last Call at the Tin Palace, projects and introspects, cultivating a memory-jogging archive of wondrous sweep. Acts of remembrance become studies in reclamation; the subjects and places these poems consider are summoned with a boundless faith in their preservation. Rain Taxi review of books <click here to read the review>
Last Call at the Tin Palace delivers. There are poems that use music (“Regarding the Percussionist,” “Pablito’s Blues”), speak about the music and the musicians (“Bass Players,” “Canadian Jazz”), but mostly poems that are music (“The Old Testament”). Brian Gilmore on JazzTimes <click here to read the review>
Paul Pines's poetry precipitates gritty reality with sparing drops of philosophical cyanide. If Robert Creeley had owned a bar, he'd have written not a few Paul Pines works - as it is he'd have approved, heartily. Andrei Codrescu
In my youth I was lucky enough to stumble into the Tin Palace. Lord, I wish I could do it today - and with Paul Pines' poems, hey! I can. Whether he's dissecting rats and roaches with scientific aplomb, or eulogizing Ellington, Eddie Jeffereson, he's always got that Low East jazz vibe. A little Roswell Rudd, a little Paul Blackburn. And when you've got that going on, you flow like beer and Borges. It's the Tin Palace. It's Paul Pines. It's where poetry is always happening. Bob Holman
Paul pines, like Homer, has the poet's ear and eye and can tell stories from his life that become cultural history as well as works of art in themselves. He captures the rugged beauty of a certain time and place, not on a ship in ancient Greece but from the sidewalks of New York and the music that was played and still reverberates. This is the kind of book you can read and re-read and feel you are part of the band. Pines got the whole picture and painted it for everyone else. David Amram
I celebrate this book & its sweet & sour hip yet hot clarity, it sbutlety & concision tempered by in-your-face mystery & hardcore knowing. Thank you, Paul Pines, for a sublime ride! David Meltzer
Paul Pines Songs from the Page of Swords consists of those personal, bounding poems, deceptively simple in short measured lines, and a soft voice that is loud enough to resonate. Pines is concious of every image, locking them with threads of sound. He has traveled, and loved, and spent difficult time alone. He has erred, sinned and found peace. Louis McKee, The American Book Review
