A Woman and a Man, Ice-Fishing

Winner of the 2004 X. J. Kennedy Poetry Prize

Poems about time and loss, chaos and creation. Rural and urban settings ranging from the mid-20th-century Midwest and contemporary New England to dream countrysides and surreal cities of exile. Includes twelve "little prayers," after Paul Goodman, with an epigraph from Goodman.

"Lee Rudolph is among the least boring poets I know. His bold, inventive work keeps handing us fresh surprises, from the surreal hilarity of the title poem to the moving 'Little Prayers.' Master of many instruments, Rudolph can deliver fat-free free verse as well as song lyrics ('Lullaby'), experimental forms ('Escape Reading,' 'Scraps from the Dream Newspaper'), and tightly rhymed lyrics ('Beauty,' 'Weather Report'). You never know what to expect from him, except that each poem will be powerful, arresting, and original."-X. J. Kennedy

"I love these strange, witty, passionate poems, so rare in their range of far and near, here and there, light and dark. 'A singing lamp,' 'lamp skull.'"-Jean Valentine