Twin Lead Lines
"These meticulously lyrical poems serve not only as auto-ethnographic lenses through which we can see both Little Jimmy Dickens being examined, but also the person doing the looking and the listening... " – Diana Khoi Nguyen, author of Root Fractures and Ghost Of
“This is a book that demands to be read and reread.” – Paige Lewis, author of Space Struck
Twin Lead Lines, the remarkably original debut from poet and musician Lou Turner, is born of overlaps: those of ancestry and chosen family, of show business and DIY paths of artmaking, and of listening deeply to others and oneself. Turner's distant cousin and Grand Ole Opry legend Little Jimmy Dickens plays a role in the poems as part-muse, part-foil, and full lode star -- not flawless, but bright -- for the poems to orient around as Turner maps her own voice and calling to artmaking. Dickens is Turner's partner in one of many of the duets played throughout Twin Lead Lines; along with a book-length series of anagram couplets, the twin-lead wire used to transmit radio signals, and the twin lead style of guitar playing made popular by Dickens’ band. Turner deftly moves between traditional and invented forms in these poems, which – like a country song – are by turns funny and searching.
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