Truffle Hound

By Luke Kennard

LUKE KENNARD's first pamphlet in six years – Truffle Hound – kicked off our experimental pamphlet series with a bang in 2018. More resolutely prose than any of his previous books of poetry (although not his novel) here Luke allows his childhood (imagined or otherwise) to flood into the foreground, while his present (factual or fake news) distorts and fractures as if his life were being directed by David Lynch and Terry Gilliam and neither could agree whether horror or comedy should dominate. Dogs, cigarettes, children and pills shouldn't really be permitted to mix should they? Here they are a heady mixture indeed!
With that nonchalant way that Luke has of seeming to toss words as if they were his hair, Truffle Hound piles neuroses on top of neuroses (not necessarily Luke's) as it tackles subjects as wildly varying and yet somehow connected as over the counter pain-killers, the domestic struggles of humans on other planets, scathing criticism (both literary and personal), transistor radios and shops – an inordinate amount of shops. (The shops are where you can buy the pills and cigarettes and food for the dogs.)
We found out today that in some colleges across the land, a certain kind of poetic output is sometimes described as being Kennardian. We don't know if Truffle Hound is Kennardian or not. (Perhaps it is Neo-Kennardian?) But we are hoping that one day soon, something, somewhere, of very little interest if needs be, will be referred to as Vervian. We are hoping this a lot.
Luke Kennard is a poet and novelist. His books have been shortlisted for the Forward Prize, the Desmond Elliott Prize and the International Dylan Thomas Prize. He lectures in the School of English at the University of Birmingham.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Verve Poetry Press
• Release date: Sep 23, 2019
• ISBN: 9781912565733

Luke Kennard

Luke Kennard is a poet and writer of fiction who was born in Kingston Upon Thames in 1981. His second collection The Harbour Beyond the Movie was published by Salt in 2007 and was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Collection, making him the youngest writer ever to be shortlisted. His most recent collection, Cain, was published by Penned in the Margins in 2016 and shortlisted for the International Dylan Thomas Prize. His first novel, The Transition, was BBC Radio 4 Book at Bedtime and was longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and his second novel The Answer to Everything will be published in 2021.

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PUBLISHED BY VERVE POETRY PRESS

Birmingham, West Midlands, UK

www.vervepoetrypress.com

[e-mail]

All rights reserved

© 2018 Luke Kennard

The right of Luke Kennard to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

No part of this work may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, recorded or mechanical, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

FIRST PUBLISHED SEP 2018

REPRINTED MAY 2019

Printed in Birmingham by Positive Print

ISBN: 978-1-912565-07-8

ePub ISBN: 978-1-912565-73-3

CONTENTS

Ibuprofen Song

A.I.

Some People Are Special But Then They Immediately Ruin It

Ghost Story

Filter

‘Nova Satus’: Nova Satus (Nova Satus)

Benediction

Parallel

Migraine

Review

Children’s Party Meal

The Plagiarism Officer

If You Were Truly Awake It Would Be Unbearable

Accountability

Italicise This

Acknowledgments

Ibruprofen Song

You can always find someone far more intelligent and someone way stupider than you so whether you’re feeling really bad about yourself or, contrariwise, you’re worried you might be getting conceited, it’s very easy to recalibrate - you only have to wander around for a bit and talk to some people. It works with anything: virtuous/evil; beautiful/ugly; pedantic/permissive; disillusioned/ idealistic.

Take me: I was writing a song about 39p ibuprofen - the kind you can get from a newsagents behind the counter. The song was set in a newsagent, a badly lit one and it was partly about how it’s weird newsagents still exist, and partly about how cheap ibuprofen is, like maybe one of the cheapest substances on earth and they should build pink and white houses with it.

But then I started thinking about a music critic and the music critic wrote Most people write songs about serious and momentous subject matters but Kennard can make poetry out of a packet of off-brand ibuprofen. And I felt 1. that wasn’t fair on most people and 2. it wasn’t even true, really, and I felt so annoyed I wanted to scream. I thought momentarily of cramming so many ibuprofen into my mouth - there are always plenty of boxes in my house, only two pills missing, hungover newsagent mornings - and crunching through their sugar shells, washing it down with a cold cup of steeped, leftover coffee so that if it didn’t kill me it would likely do permanent damage to my stomach; you can always find someone with a more permanently damaged stomach than you