This Is What You Need To Live

If you're finding KaraokeFanboy Press through the Poetry Superhighway, welcome to my corner of the Internet.  I've been self-publishing my own comics and poetry in Phoenix since 2010, and this has been an exciting year for me.

In May, I ran a successful Kickstarter to self-publish my mini-comic book, Amazing Arizona Comics, monthly, and since then I've had several opportunities to share my work with the public: at Ignite Phoenix 17, on my local NBC news, and most recently on NPR's local program The Show.  With so much emphasis on my comics work, I thought my inclinations toward poetry might suffer, so I've made a proactive effort to keep writing, as much as I've been drawing.

This chapbook is one of the results.  This Is What You Need To Live is a small collection of this year's writings, with another to follow toward the end of the year.  My writing has taken an economic turn lately; my poems have become rather brief, in comparison to work from the past.  So, I like the idea of my chapbook format adapting accordingly, measured at a mere 4.25" x 5.5".  Yes, it's half of a sheet of paper, folded along the portrait orientation, creating a backpocket-sized digest you can take on the bus and probably read in the single ride.  I hope its impression creates an urgency, that this must be read now, in its entirety . . . less of a whole record album, and more of an EP, really.

This Is What You Need To Live is completely self-published (printed, folded, and stapled by yours truly), and the cost includes shipping.  Even if the poetry doesn't impress you (and I do hope it does), rest assured that purchasing this chapbook supports an artist that still believes in handcrafting his work!

A special thanks to my friend and fellow Phoenix poet Gary Bowers, who was kind enough to write the intro to this chapbook.  I'm a huge fan of his work, both writing and drawing, which can be found here.  Also, I'd like to thank Tristan Marshell, who asked me to feature at Glendale's Words in the Alley back in February, and I agreed, in spite of myself.  That really got this ball rolling.

Finally, thank you for still reading blog posts to completion.  I hope you'll spend some time and money on This Is What You Need To Live, because I do have more to come, and it is, for me, exactly as the title of this chapbook insists.