Monstrance

By Al Anderson

Hotly anticipated debut collection from neo-surrealist queer poet Al Anderson.

Al Anderson's debut collection Monstrance is about queerness, the occult, and the slowly collapsing dreamscapes of post-industrial Britain. With characteristic black humour this collection poses Birmingham as an urban embodiment of our times.

A monstrance is a sacred vessel found in Catholic churches, used to contain the consecrated sacraments. Here the monstrance becomes a symbolic vessel for memory, desire, and a means for containing the ruins of failed utopias.

In a fractured cityscape, the figure of Ram, an occultic leakage that emanates from the monstrance, guides us through Anderson's lyric imaginary. Holy visions are delivered in newbuilds at the city limits, beautiful young men hang from Judas Trees in suburban parks and Ram clings to the balustrades of history and time dealing out lust, solace, and retribution.

Monstrance is the latest in the urban-homosexual lyric continuum. Equal parts indebted to the surrealist and confessional traditions, this is a collection of erotics and the ennui of queer desire under late capitalism.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1067693971
• ISBN13: 9781067693978
• Release Date: March 2027
• Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
• Length: 80 Pages