Ananda Osel's 'Dispatches' are far from absurd

June 25, 9:42 AMSeattle Books ExaminerDanielle Dreger-Babbitt

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Local poet Ananada Osel

Seattle may only have a number of small printing presses, but those presses are doing some big things.  Proletariat Press (with six titles printed thus far) strives to publish the best in underground poetry.  Proletariat Press was founded just a couple of years ago to help local poet (and Portland native)  Ananda Osel promote his work.  His three chapbooks, The Meter is Running & We're Almost Out of Change (2008), A SonofaBitch (2009), and Dispatches from the Third World (2009), are featured on the site.

Like Proletariat Press, Osel is relatively new to the poetry scene.  Despite his newcomer status, Osel is already a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee ("The Carnal Hypothesis" and "Pretty Damn Good") and has had his work published in New York Quarterly, Denver Syntax, Word Riot Magazine, and The Beat.  This is pretty remarkable coming from someone who didn't write poetry "seriously or consistently" until 2006 and considers his writing outside of poetry to be "mediocre."  In an interview Osel called himself an absurdist in an effort to describe his worldview and his work.  He says is heavily influenced by his “personal existential angst" and "Jean-Paul Sartre, Ice Cube, and goats," meaning pretty much anything and everything inspires him.  He says that all of his work is autobiographical in one way or another.  He considers each poem to be "an honest snapshot."

Osel's third collection of poetry

Osel's latest chapbook Dispatches from the Third World was published this Spring (in time for National Poetry Month) and was inspired by a trip to Thailand in April.  The 23 poems were written and edited and published in a span of two months.  He had visited Thailand before and went a second time to specifically write this book.  He was there for less than a month and wrote nearly 40 poems there.  The poems in Dispatches were selected from that material.

Even though the chapbook is less than 40 pages, it still packs quite a punch.  Most of the poems are serious reflections on the poverty and prostitution and politics in this third world country; however, there are a few that are unintentionally funny like "A Real American" where he tells a tuk tuk driver he's from Canada and the the driver asks, "what is a Canada?" and "Conversation with Monk at 7-11."  The most profound poem in the collection is "Dispatches from the Third World" where Osel admits that he thought about not writing the poem out of respect to the "proud nationalistic people" of Thailand but found that he could not ignore the truth about young Thai prostitutes. 

After I finished Dispatches I felt like I had traveled to Thailand without suffering through a day-long flight or adding a stamp to my passport.  Osel is descriptive enough that he really does give the reader an honest snapshot of life, but is still concise with the language used so that each reader can add to it.  I hadn't expected to enjoy his poetry as much as I did.  At times his poems reminded me of some of the work Jeff Tweedy (of the band Wilco) did in his 2004 book of poetry Adult Head.  He really does write for the reader and not an audience.  When I asked Osel who he thought his audience might be he said, " I just expect that they're not above reproach because I'm certainly not.  In other words, I doubt my readers ever got a pony for Christmas."

I was far from disappointed by his work.  And considering how I never got a pony for Christmas, I'd say he definitely has found a new fan.  I hope that he continues to take these fantastic photos and share them with the world.