a short history of crazy bone

The voice of Crazy Bone takes you on a mesmerizing journey in Patrick Friesen’s evocative new long poem. Crazy Bone lives on the edge of the world, at the edge of time, wandering the mid-path of her life, on the outskirts of a small town. She is caught in her own monologue, soul-talking, listening to herself, to the river. Crazy Bone is a trickster, a fool, a wild woman laughing, a campesino, who through loss is finding her way back to herself. In the forest she has her own rituals to place her feet on the earth again, though sometimes she floats or spins on her toes, blurts a curse or licks blood. Society has dismissed her presence as irrelevant, but Crazy is cleverly confident, and tests the reader. In her rambling, she references writers, singers, artists, theologians, tightrope walkers, philosophers, not as experts but as guides along the way. You won’t forget her voice after she has passed you on her way to the river.