Always Something (2023) by Jim Dodge

Always Something is a collection of poems by northern California poet, novelist, and pioneer bioregionalism advocate Jim Dodge. The poems are laced with a good dose of self-deprecating humor, poignant insight into a good long life, and a wry focus about getting older, living off the grid, and knowing one’s family, community, and place.

On Destroying My Third Refrigerator in Seven Years
by Defrosting It with a Filét Knife

True accidents are never senseless.
If nothing else, the slaughter of large appliances discourages cupidity,
And the brain-mushing pamper of convenience is surely deterred.
The gods appreciate a smile when you accept your fate:
Not every blossom becomes a peach;
So few of us reach the pure state of relentless stupidity.

Jim Dodge is a self-described “Taoist dirt pagan and practicing pantheist who may have been born enlightened but pissed it away through thousands of sweet attachments and too many random acts of sheer folly. Dwindling into decrepitude, he splits his time between an isolated ranch in the coastal wilds of the Gualala watershed and the semi-settled Eureka peninsula.”

He is also is a Humbolt State University Professor Emeritus and the author of three works of fiction: the hilariously brilliant tale Fup (City Miner Books, 1983; Simon & Schuster, 1984), the novels Not Fade Away (Atlantic Monthly Press, 1987) and Stone Junction (Grove Press, 1998), an earlier collection of poems and prose, Rain on the River (Grove/Canongate Books, 2002), and a number of other broadsides, chapbooks, and screeds.

Always Something was letterpress printed by Rick Ardinger in a limited edition of 400 copies in the summer of 2023. The paper is Mohawk Superfine, collated and sewn by hand between Thai Chiri endsheets and Canson wrappers.