The Sublimation of Frederick Eckert

by Travis Cebula

Poetry. "Travis Cebula's THE SUBLIMATION OF FREDERICK ECKERT is a fascinating text that asks the reader to consider how action, and the shadows of action, leave imprints in space. In doing so, Cebula presents a mixture of more traditional narrative, along with splintered, splintering fragments of language that together form a nuanced version of story that questions what it means to be whole, and how we construct, and receive, narrative (and wholeness). There is real sadness in these pages, and even wishful thinking, along with the sublimation promised by the title. There's also penance and forgiveness, and a promise of slightly altered outcomes, if only. As we read Cebula's work, we are 'furled by invitation' 'to the strange we that forms inside.'"--Jenny Drai "Cebula's lines tend to sparkle via mirage like sequence. He animates the atomized personality via THE SUBLIMATION OF FREDERICK ECKERT. In this book he attempts to rise above the magnetic shadow of the city as locus of material debris, always attempting to sublimate its poisonous morality of tedium and its attendant psychic carnage."--Will Alexander "What sort of poet takes up--as subject, as symbol, as a way into and through to something else, something larger--a man, an actual historical figure, whose only notable accomplishment in life seems to have been killing himself? Travis Cebula is that poet. His subject, Frederick Eckert, died 85 years ago, the only person ever to have leapt from the 102nd floor of the Empire State Building. THE SUBLIMATION OF FREDERICK ECKERT is an examination, and an investigation, of obsession and delusion as a sort of mystical seeking, as vision or as vision quest. Cebula's Eckert almost certainly comes closer to ecstatic transformation than the original. But then, what's so compelling about this book is that we are made to believe that this imaginative account may well be spot on."--Robert Wrigley

Genres: Poetry

84 pages, Paperback

Published December 15, 2017

About the author

Travis Cebula currently resides in Golden, Colorado. His poetry, photographs, essays, and stories have appeared in or are forthcoming from New American Writing, BlazeVOX, Tarpaulin Sky, Aufgabe, Versal, Eleven-Eleven, NO/ON, The Talking River Review, Monkey Puzzle, E-Ratio, Cricket Online Review, Otoliths, In Stereo Magazine, Fact-Simile, Bombay Gin, Dear Sir, Trunk of Delirium, The Strip, Right Hand Pointing, Leveler, and Whrrds. His most recent collection of poetry, One Year in a Paper Cinema , is available now from BlazeVOX Books and Amazon.com. Travis is also the founder and editor of Shadow Mountain Press, specializing in limited-edition chapbooks. He teaches at the Left Bank Writers Retreat in Paris in June.

Reviews

[Grady · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘a vacuum lingers where his son once was’

Colorado author/port Travis Cebula writes, edits, and teaches creative writing. His poems, photographs, essays, and stories have appeared internationally in various print and on-line journals. He is the author of five full-length collections of poetry - DANGEROUS THINGS TO PLEASE A GIRL, AFTER THE FOX, JAMAICA, BUT FOR A BRIEF INTERLUDE, UNDER THE SKY THEY LIT CITIES, ONE YEAR IN A PAPER CINEMA. ITACA: A LIFE IN FOUR FRAGMENTS, SOME EXITS, and now THE SUBLIMATION OF FREDERICK ECKERT.

The magic of Travis’ poetry is not only in the choice of tangential subject matter, but also in the manner in which he place the words on the page – a distinctive additive to the overall presentation of his thought provoking poetry.

Catalyst for Ordination #1

it has been said
that a vacuum –
which is to say,
a space without a breath or
wind in it –
feathers and rocks
will fall, like humans,
at exactly the same rate

and those who saw
it happen, they said
he fell like a spider –
something about the limbs,

they said, and they said
the word, ”carom” –
as if it applied to a human –

and manifest on that word
was the exact historic mixture
of hard sounds
battering soft –

and how beautiful,
his vestments fluttered –

and what if –
if he survived?
would we –
recognize him

by his limping?

Search for meaning in this one excerpt and it becomes clear that the entire collection must be absorbed. Wondrous!

[Marcy Rae Henry]

hope to see you again in NOLA, travis!