Phoems for Mobil Vices by Rich Murphy

Poetry editors learn quickly to perk up when opening submissions from certain authors. So it is when Rich Murphy shows up in my inbox.   Poets who struggle with line limits—and all writers who struggle with word-count limits--can learn much from Rich's shortest poems of, oh, five words .   I mean, we're getting into Jesus wept territory, here.    Rich's poems, like bullets, are small things capable of considerable impact.

— Dale Wisely , RIGHT HAND POINTING

“intriguing and somehow informative poems.”

— Erica Wright, Poetry Editor, Guernica

Rich Murphy is a genuine experimentalist, a tinkerer, a risk-taker of arresting, original, mordantly hilarious poems. He never seems content to repeat an achieved effect. He is always wrestling with some new project. He will figure into zany anthologies. And be admired for "difficulties," while in fact commanding attention through the clear vigor of his inventions. Rich Murphy, American original.

– George Starbuck

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Rich Murphy was born in Lynn, Massachusetts and has taught writing and literature for 23 years at Bradford College, Emmanuel College and now at Virginia Commonwealth University. He received his undergraduate degree and his graduate degree in creative writing from Boston University, studying with Derek Walcott and the late George Starbuck.

His collection of poems titled, Voyeur, was the 2008 Gival Press Poetry Award winner and will be out in October. Credits include a book of poems The Apple in the Monkey Tree by Codhill Press; chapbooks Great Grandfather by Pudding House Publications, Family Secret by Finishing Line Press, and Hunting and Pecking by Ahadada Press; poems in hundreds of journals; and essays in refereed journals, including Reconfigurations: A Journal for Poetics Poetry / Literature and Culture.

Book Information:

· Paperback: 73 pages
· Binding: Perfect-Bound
· Publisher: BlazeVOX [books]
· ISBN: 9781935402527