Pierrot's Fingernails

by Kit Schluter

Poetry. PIERROT'S FINGERNAILS is the much-anticipated first collection of poetry by Kit Schluter, known to many as an acclaimed translator of French and Spanish literature. Like a garden labyrinth, the poems in this book offer unexpected pleasures and revelations, of curiosity, weirdness, society, solitude, and warmth.

Genres: Poetry

96 pages, Paperback

Published May 1, 2020

Reviews

[Henry Kellogg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kit Schluter’s first book, Pierrot’s Fingernails ( Canarium Books, 2020) is a hallucinatory mindscape which is certainly apt given that I read this surreal book at surreal time. I had moved to a new city 4 months ago and I had been unemployed one week when I read it. I read it over a two week span to be able to savor the weirdness, and yet sincere storytelling of each of these poems. I read the last one right after a state of emergency was declared about the Coronavirus. The L-train in Chicago became more and more sparsely populated as I read the final poem, leaving me to read the final section of the titular poem of the collection almost entirely alone.
HIs collection begins with the 7 part “Bad Faith” which curiously explores the theme with such gem lines as “I never skimp when I shoplift” and “I am an individual thus I have no bed time”. The poem is joyous and fun and is surreal without sacrificing clarity. Much of the collection continues like that, with great lines which also explore the ins and outs of language.
His brief poem Vergangenheitsbewaltigung had me reaching for an old college german textbook to find out what exactly he meant, (a feeling or understanding and getting over the past- specifically related to WWII), but also not needing to know exactly what he meant to be ensconced by the beauty of his language. His poem Cociane/Zeugma had me wondering exactly wash Zeugma was, but then once I did, knowing exactly what he was talking about and being able to relate to the topic he was considering. At times his poems are opaque, but like the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC, they shine back on you in their darkness reflecting the original emotion of the reader.
Kit’s poems are at his best when the mirror reality most emotionally. The poem Fruit Flies deals with a serious subject (death/suicide), but still manages to make it funny. I never quite thought of the fruit flies that would ruin a nice glass of wine left out too long on a summer’s day, but after reading it I am stuck with an image that the author, when he must have been looking at daed fruit flies in wine which he must have left out. Then I see him writing this poem about the desire for an untimely death. The lines are short and paint a tight picture which leaves the reader entranced in a moment in the author’s mind.

Kit is at his best at his most succinct. I will (with his permission?) repeat the penultimate poem of this collection in full.

Illegibility

Watch the better days riding their magic carpet up through the windmill arms!

A poem like this can be read at least three ways. One, with the nostalgic poet imagining his past days of joy being knocked away in a dirty carpet though some old-timey dutch windmill. Two, someone living their best life in a van imagining their home/conveyance as a magic carpet being swept up in the benevolent arms of some high functioning electric grid enhancing modern white windmill. Third is as someone watching a floating plastic bag at dust across some rocky mountain prairie imagining the magical engineering of that plastic turning it to carpet as it swept itself through the windmill arms of wind of the high mountains. Or maybe there are four? Maybe you read it differently than I did. That’s ok.

This final titular work of this collection Pierrot’s Fingernails is a deep yet playful meditation on the relationship between the author and the muse. I’m glad I read it in one long subway ride, as the train got emptier and emptier and the surreal news of the ghastly present surrounded us I was glad to be left with this poem, that urges you to believe that your muse is as close as you allow him/her/it to be.
Kit Schulter has a clear vision and a mature vision. These are rarely found in a new poet starting off these roaring 2020s with a fresh voice . This book left me feeling that if it were the last book I read before dying of the coronavirus, that would be ok. Buy Kit Schluter’s Pierrot’s Fingernails through Canarium Books or wherever high quality new voices in poetry are sold.

[Benjamin Niespodziany · Rating 5 out of 5]

A dense and challenging and rewarding collection, Kit Schluter's Pierrot's Fingernails feels like tumbling back in time with a dunce cap and a diary. This is a formal and meditative showcase of a poet's love of words, of absurdism, of the classics. A celebration of sentences, of translation, of the thoughtful line. It's one I read back in March and didn't know how to rate/review, and one I read again in August, and couldn't stop underlining.

[Noah Warren · Rating 5 out of 5]

A dizzying book of great beauty and intelligence. Schluter's collection twists the tools of high modernism, and deep reading, into a wryly contemporary bouquet. Astonishing— 

[Lizzy Gruschow · Rating 5 out of 5]

a beautiful menagerie of words. only a fool wouldn’t read this devilish (emphasis on devilish) book.