“There’s a wisdom in it that is rare and so, so vibrant (courage).” – NEIL SURKAN, Unbecoming
KIRBY POETRY IS QUEER
PUB DATE 01 OCTOBER 2021 PALIMPSEST PRESS
ON SALE NOW! ANSTRUTHER PRESS
NOW IN ITS SECOND PRINTING
The tears fill my eyes as they drop on my cheeks, a half-smile buried underneath. Kirby’s poem had to be read twice and three times and more because it grips you by the throat and doesn’t let go. Even in the end, I am still in a bittersweet aching state. His words are not for the faint of heart. “Cocksuckers know. It’s a calling.” HASAN NAMIR, The Poetry Question
KIRBY THIS IS WHERE I GET OFF PERMANENT SLEEP PRESS
BUY THE BOOK
“The simplicity and grace of the design of this small title is quite striking … these are poems that proclaim a victory through perseverance, survival and a refusal to not exist loudly and joyously…” @robmclennanblog
“So much poetry seems mechanical…that tires me, [KIRBY] speaks to the essential…a flash of light to orient by. Heartening, inspiring, vulnerable. People at Tree Series were utterly enthralled. Still floating.” – PEARL PIRIE
In [Kirby’s] She’s Having A Doris Day, there are juxtapositions between white middle class politesse and what’s hidden beneath the surface, such as cockroaches in “White Sale”, a pristine bed that is never used for sex. I like the way gender is handled in an almost casual way in this poem. In “Adam’s Feet” we have the image of fragility and volatility: lilies in a glass vase in a church at the funeral for the victims of the Florida shooting and wanting to kiss the feet of a straight man who would kill the speaker if he knew. These juxtapositions between love and hate, appearances and reality create powerful poems…so fucking irreverent, joyous and sad all at the same time. – AMANDA EARL, Kiki
What pulls She’s Having A Doris Day together is the sense of honesty about it all, the openness of voice and experience that weaves itself through the eight poems. What Kirby does with their work is important. The poems speak of how a search for personal identity is often fraught with challenges, but is just as often triumphant in the seemingly smallest of ways—from a morning routine, to a Sunday dinner, to the memory of a lover’s body that winds itself into the sensuality of language. This little collection is one that leads to Kirby’s first full length book, This is Where I Get Off, which will be published by Permanent Sleep Press, in Spring 2019. If what we read here is any indication, that book, too, will be of strong and certain voice. – KIM FAHNER, debbie
NOW IN IT’S THIRD FOURTH [FINAL] PRINTING SOLD OUT
JEFF KIRBY She’s Having a Doris Day
Chapbook
ISBN 978 0 9959300 0 1
knife | fork | book
Cover: Drew Shannon
Each day she wakens / wonders what day is / this? what, if anything, she / has to do, or even if / she has to
In She’s Having a Doris Day, we find ourselves lost in pinkness, genderqueerness, whiteness, madness, sadness, gladness, and the beauty that keeps us here. From an entire morning finding her coffee, waking to the news of today’s massacre, to still having to deal with men. This is classic Kirby.
NOW AVAILABLE ON E-BOOK + AUDIO
$12 (+$4 shipping) Available here (PayPal) NOTE: US orders in USD funds.
Never thought I would see, let alone hold, a copy of this very limited edition (no.13 of 50) early chapbook of mine, the world is fucked and sometimes beautiful (self-published 1995), but there it was, ‘signed by Kirby!’ online in Pittsburgh. Good news, a number of these will be included in my first full-length, This Is Where I Get Off (Permanent Sleep Press, 22/04/2019).
SIMPLE ENOUGH Two Shorts by Jeff Kirby. Self-published. Design by Don Pyle. 1985
COCK & SOUL. Jeff Kirby. Five monologue plays. Forward by Sky Gilbert. Gay Vision Press, Toronto. 1991
THE WORLD IS FUCKED AND SOMETIMES BEAUTIFUL. Jeff Kirby. Self published. 1995. BOB’S BOY. Jeff Kirby. Self published. 1996.
SHE’S HAVING A DORIS DAY. Jeff Kirby. knife| fork | book, 2017. Cover: Drew Shannon. Design: Norman Nehmetallah. Published at Coach House. Four printings. 500 copies. ISBN 978 0 9959300 0 1
THIS IS WHERE I GET OFF. KIRBY. Permanent Sleep Press. 2019. Layout by Scott Wade. ISBN 978 0 9936107 9 0
KIRBY 