Nothing Much

In a bookstore in Baltimore I bought the most wonderful little book. I found it in the "zine" section and it is about the size of my hand with the fingers spread, and it has eleven wonderfully-textured, all-cotton pages. The cover is made of slightly heavier brown all-cotton paper, and reads, in small, black, sans-serif type: Nothing Much - Robert Schreur.

On the back page reads: "I set the type and printed a hundred copies." and is signed, in pencil, "RS".

The book contains eighteen short poems. I will quote a few of them for you.

*******************

"TRIFLE

If it fits
Infinity
Fits in it."


*******************


"I longed for
belonging
long before
belonging
but forgot
belonging
would not
be for long."


******************

"SEESAW

I know
I did
not see
what now
I know
I saw."

*******************


"I read
and write
to excite
my want
for what is
neither real
nor not."

**********************

"As much
as I
wanted much
much less
even least
was best."


*********************

This is a feeling that perhaps people who scour used record stores and people who frequent yard sales will appreciate: knowing about something that's really really good that very few other people know about. It makes you feel devoted to the passionate artist, as if to a person drowning in the river when you are the only bystander who knows how to swim. They have an artistic vision that they are driven to communicate to the world, but who else will appreciate it but you? Without your appreciation, your understanding of their wonderful gift, their art would be meaningless. They really need you! I feel this way about Robert Schreur. But I don't want to be selfish about this; I'd like him not to have to depend on me (or whatever lucky 99 people got the rest of his print run). So I'd like to share him with you.