Exhuming the Monster

By Al Ferber

A highly unlikely convergence of three pivotal points in this writers history that had remained unaddressed until now: the beginnings of this writer, first wife stricken by schizophrenia,
and her sudden death.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 16, 2022
• ISBN: 9781669856221

Al Ferber

Al Ferber a septuagenerian going on 13. Born. Regrettably… A North Philly kid. Survived education at Temple U., Penn State, Villanova U. Alcoholic 30 years. Sober 23 years. Indenture servant to Catherine the Great 34 years. Learned to love and appreciate cats and one dog. Authored 30 books of poems, 2 novels, 3 chap books. Poems in Magazines in U.S., England, Scotland, France. Still alive, on the downward path of the sliding board, as of this writing. An undocumented alien in the world. Resides Ocean City, NJ surrounded by water with Cathi, Luna, Mitzi, and Opal. So there.

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Copyright © 2022 by Al Ferber.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

All poems in this book previously appeared in Mangle/zine and Evolution of an Accidental Painting. They are reprinted here with my permission. Al Ferber - editor / publisher

Cover Photo by Al Ferber

Author Photo by Al Ferber

Introduction by Hop Wechsler published here with his permission

Preface by Al Ferber

Rev. date: 11/16/2022

Xlibris

844-714-8691

www.Xlibris.com

848151

CONTENTS

Intro

Prologue

Exhuming The Monster

Winter Solstice

Other Shit

INTRO

by Hop Wechsler

William Carlos Williams, a fellow New Jersey poet (born, not transplanted), once wrote that he had discovered that the thrill of first love passes! It even becomes the backbone of a sordid sort of religion if not assisted in passing. He also wrote (two sentences later) that he had never or seldom said to his wife my dear I love you, when I would rather say: My dear, I wish you were in Tierra del Fuego.

William Carlos Williams was married once. He had multiple affairs, including a Baroness. How many times did he wish his wife were in Tierra del Fuego? How many times did he actually say it?

*

If most marriages don’t end when the thrill of love passes, most marriages that end don’t end because the thrill of love passes but for some other, weightier, more soul-deadening reason. Michael Ventura, the former L.A. Weekly columnist, once defined the solace of marriage as the discovery of what is unbreakable among all that’s been broken. Sometimes, there’s nothing that’s unbreakable and everything is broken. Sometimes, one person’s demons can’t support the weight of another’s. In a few cases, those demons are real.

*

Michael Ventura also wrote that "we are all, every one of us, full of horror. If you are getting married to try to make yours go away, you will only succeed in marrying your horror to someone else’s horror,