that one time we were almost people

Debut poetry collection by Christian Czaniecki. Heavily influenced in his 20’s by the work of Dean Young, particularly “Not In Any Haha Way”, and the poets that followed the New York school and Surrealist.  Christian spent a great deal of his time since realizing he wanted to write poetry trying not to be a poet.  He believes strongly in the human capacity to experience loss and the need to share that feeling through language.  His ideas of how the world looks and the difference between how it should look are central to the exploration of large emotions that are, he believes, undefinable but aspirational.  He also feels that there is no way to talk about the romantic ideas of love, joy, death, and longing without the companion elements life attaches to them of grief, addiction, fear, hubris, and noncommittal.  There is certainly something being sought in his poems but if you asked him he would say its not his responsibility to find it, once they are written they belong to someone else.

Christian was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 2007 he received an MFA from Queens University of Charlotte and promptly quit writing for 10 years.  When he returned to writing he brought with him the actual experiences of life he imagined and tried to convey in his earlier poems.  He currently lives in Baltimore with his wife Morgan and his cat Fish.  He teaches 12th grade English and Special Education and does other things sometimes.