Zero Readership: An Epic

Author: Filip Marinovich Publisher: Ugly Duckling Presse (2008) "In his wily, edgy and hyperactive debut collection of thematically linked poems, Marinovich follows a prodigal grandson—ostensibly the poet—who returns to Belgrade, or 'Marinovichland,' over the course of five years. During each visit, the poet transcribes conversations and shapes them into 'typewriter portraits, ' poems meant to be like family photographs. Opening with the darkly beautiful 'Belgrade Eyes, ' Marinovich elegizes a relative who has committed suicide, unable to face 'twelve years of war.' Second-guessing his right to celebrate or mourn his own ethnic and familial history—'[w]ho are you to sing the dead you never knew?'—each poem comes closer to embracing the self-appointed role of bard journalist by addressing war and its aftermath in a removed albeit intimate manner: 'befriend radiation— / deal with traces of / depleted uranium bombing / by NATO in '99.' Later, Marinovich points out ironies in the U.S.: 'O