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The Poems: a novella
The Poems is an absorbing meditation on the life of verse. In its pages, you witness the poem being born, taking form, growing straight and true, morphing and morphing again, evolving in idiom, metastasizing in lies, gaining remission in honesty, and, healed at last, becoming you.
Epigrammatic and richly allusive, The Poems is a book for those in search of a reading experience beyond immersion, who seek something closer to transubstantiation.
“In William Walsh’s The Poems, the Poem itself is a character, is a plot, is a way in and a way out. The book is an experiment in sound; its musical riffing is a joy to read. It is pithy, open-hearted, rhythmic, seductive, and witty. ‘The poem had lost some teeth to years of gnawing. The poem had sturm. The poem had drang,’ he says. Drawing on literature, song, newspapers, life, Walsh creates a world all his own, a world where the Poem is king, lover and challenger. It’s a singular achievement sustained over 100+ entrancing pages. Let this line be its statement of purpose: ‘The poem’s resting heartbeat was love.’ It’s a heartbeat that sounds like your own, and yet is universal.” —Corey Mesler, author of Memphis Movie
“While the construction of The Poems must be acknowledged—Walsh's skill is undeniable, the use of allusion and other poetic devices masterful—you are immediately in the book, inside its beating, bleeding human heart, and the feeling Walsh’s collage of voices creates is something akin to being in love. It is a playful explosion, but also an incantation, a hypnotic spiral; my trance is still lingering. Read it aloud, if you can, and feel the entire world move through you.” —Emily Costa, author of Until It Feels Right
“In The Poems, Walsh veers into the oncoming traffic that is hagiography, giving us much less the definition of a poem than its life and the miracles it has performed. ‘Yes, the poem was a chancer,’ he writes, reminding us that neither saints nor poems live to old age and die surrounded by their families. Walsh gives us the experience of martyrdom, of living and dying by the line.” —Amish Trivedi, author of FuturePanic
Epigrammatic and richly allusive, The Poems is a book for those in search of a reading experience beyond immersion, who seek something closer to transubstantiation.
“In William Walsh’s The Poems, the Poem itself is a character, is a plot, is a way in and a way out. The book is an experiment in sound; its musical riffing is a joy to read. It is pithy, open-hearted, rhythmic, seductive, and witty. ‘The poem had lost some teeth to years of gnawing. The poem had sturm. The poem had drang,’ he says. Drawing on literature, song, newspapers, life, Walsh creates a world all his own, a world where the Poem is king, lover and challenger. It’s a singular achievement sustained over 100+ entrancing pages. Let this line be its statement of purpose: ‘The poem’s resting heartbeat was love.’ It’s a heartbeat that sounds like your own, and yet is universal.” —Corey Mesler, author of Memphis Movie
“While the construction of The Poems must be acknowledged—Walsh's skill is undeniable, the use of allusion and other poetic devices masterful—you are immediately in the book, inside its beating, bleeding human heart, and the feeling Walsh’s collage of voices creates is something akin to being in love. It is a playful explosion, but also an incantation, a hypnotic spiral; my trance is still lingering. Read it aloud, if you can, and feel the entire world move through you.” —Emily Costa, author of Until It Feels Right
“In The Poems, Walsh veers into the oncoming traffic that is hagiography, giving us much less the definition of a poem than its life and the miracles it has performed. ‘Yes, the poem was a chancer,’ he writes, reminding us that neither saints nor poems live to old age and die surrounded by their families. Walsh gives us the experience of martyrdom, of living and dying by the line.” —Amish Trivedi, author of FuturePanic
111 pages, Paperback
Published August 16, 2025
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About the author
William Walsh
100 books71 followersWilliam Walsh is the author of The Poems and The Poets (both from Erratum Press), Forty-five American Boys (Outpost19), ON TV, Unknown Arts, Ampersand, Mass., Pathologies, Questionstruck, Stephen King Stephen King (all from Keyhole Press), and Without Wax: A Documentary Novel (Casperian Books).
His work has appeared in Annalemma, Artifice, Quick Fiction,, New York Tyrant, Caketrain, Juked, LIT, Rosebud, Quarterly West, Crescent Review, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, as well as anthologies like The &NOW Anthology: Best of Innovative Writing, Dzanc's Best of the Web, and New Micro: Norton Anthology of Exceptionally Short Fiction.
His work has appeared in Annalemma, Artifice, Quick Fiction,, New York Tyrant, Caketrain, Juked, LIT, Rosebud, Quarterly West, Crescent Review, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, as well as anthologies like The &NOW Anthology: Best of Innovative Writing, Dzanc's Best of the Web, and New Micro: Norton Anthology of Exceptionally Short Fiction.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
January 28, 2026
Pretty clever! The poem has a life-of-its-own in The Poems. Ironically the book is composed in prose format but Walsh’s language and variety bring the poem to life. There are pop culture references and a stream-of-consciousness feel to the collection. I feel as if the poem is a bit rebellious in this novella and I’ve wondered to which poem the text is referring to. Ultimately the poem is personified and it seems to be an “object” that most people would relate with.
Displaying 1 of 1 review