Curses for Your Sake

Javen Tanner

Mormon Artists Group is pleased to announce the publication of Javen Tanner’s first volume of poetry, Curses for Your Sake. Tanner’s poems have appeared in American Poetry Journals Southwestern American Literature, The Midwest Quarterly, The Roanoke Review, DMQ Review, Rock Salt Plum, Three Candles, The Raintree Review, and others. The fourteen poems in this chapbook traverse a landscape of contemporary wandering and rumination. The title comes from the third chapter of the book of Genesis in which man is sent out from Eden to till the ground cursed for his sake. At turns contemplative, elegiac, and playful, the poems are grounded in personal experiences; they examine relationships in the family,and they observe life out in the world.

The volume is 48 pages in length and is published in two formats: a softcover commercial volume and a hand-bound limited edition. An excerpt (with an audio clip of the author reading, at right):

Snow

I stood at the window with my mother

and watched a cluster of deer,

their summer red long gone.

The cracking bones of the house,

the heat rising from floor vents,

the click and toss of the dishwasher—

all of this was almost too much to bear.

But it was the snow that finished me,

the endless falling of some pure bread,

crustless and broken; how it carefully erased

all distances, quieted the mountain jays,

and melted on the windows;

how it mocked my mother’s tears

as she pressed her face

against the glass and wept.

I pretended not to notice.

The deer blurred into a single stain

swallowed up in the whiteness.

Javen Tanner

Javen Tanner is from Kanab, Utah and lives in New York, New York. He holds an MFA degree from the University of San Diego/Old Globe Theatre. He is the associate artistic director of the Handcart Ensemble in New York City.

The Editions

Curses for  Your Sake is published in two formats––a commercial edition (softcover, saddlestitch bound, 6"x9", 48 pages), and a limited edition.

The limited edition is covered in dark, richly-colored, handmade paper of hemp and flax fibers, hand bound over boards with linen thread and tapes, and silk headbands, 7.25"x10". The text paper is Mohawk Superfine. The limited edition includes an audio CD recording of the poetry read by Javen Tanner. The book is signed and numbered by the artist in an edition limited to ten copies, plus two artist’s proofs and one publisher’s proof.

Limited edition – no longer available

Commercial edition – no longer available