One-Legged Poetry

To experience Jacko Monahan reading his poetry live, which he did every month for more than twenty years at the Brighton Bar in Long Branch, N.J., was to experience what a number of auditors have called his "word-uzi." In One-Legged Poetry: Tragedy, Politics & a Sea Monster, Monahan has published his first full collection of poems, so that readers can experience his highly readable work in print virtually for the first time. Jacko once said, "Life is pain, and you have to learn how to survive it." The poems in One-Legged Poetry are, more than any others he has written, about working through pain-the pain of losing his sight, the opening of old tar burns on his legs, and the loss of his leg to flesh-eating bacteria, all the while remaining intensely alive, human, and creative. Monahan's voice is unique and powerful and these poems break new ground.