Winner of the Hollis Summers Poetry Prize Florida Book Awards Gold Medal Winner Stephen Kampa’s poems are witty and restless in their pursuit of an intelligent modern faith. They range from a four-line satire of office inspirational posters to a lengthy meditation on the silence of God. The poems also revel in the prosodic possibilities of English’s high and low registers: a twenty–one line homage to Lord Byron that turns on three rhymes (one of which is “eisegesis”); a sestina whose end words include “sentimental,” “Marseilles,” and “Martian;” sapphics on the death of Ray Charles; and intricately modulated stanzas on the 1931 Spanish–language movie version of Dracula.  Despite the metaphysical seriousness, there is always an undercurrent of stylistic levity ― a panoply of puns, comic rhymes, and loving misquotations of canonical literature ― that suggests comedy and tragedy are inextricably bound in human experience.

Cracks in the Invisible: Poems (Hollis Summers Poetry Prize)

Literature & Fiction

Kampa, Stephen

Poetry

Ohio University Press

This is the annual Able Muse Review (Print Edition) - Winter 2020/2021 issue, Number 28. This issue continues the tradition of masterfully crafted poetry, fiction, essays, art & photography, and book reviews that have become synonymous with the Able Muse-online and in print. After more than a decade of online publishing excellence, Able Muse print edition maintains the superlative standard of the work presented all these years in the online edition, and, the Able Muse Anthology (Able Muse Press, 2010). Includes the winning stories and poems from the 2020 Able Muse contest (Able Muse Write Prize) winners and finalists. ". . . [ ABLE MUSE ] fills an important gap in understanding what is really happening in early twenty-first century American poetry."-Dana Gioia. "Able Muse is refreshing to read for its selection of poetry that adheres to form . . . a quality magazine offering the reader informed and unexpected views on life."-NewPages. CONTENTS: WITH THE 2020 ABLE MUSE WRITE PRIZE FOR POETRY & FICTION - Includes the winning story and poems from the contest winners and finalists EDITORIAL - Alexander Pepple FEATURED ART - An Exotic Theme INTERNATIONAL FICTION SPECIAL FEATURE - L.M. Brown, John McLennon, Nageen Rather, Guadalupe Sexto, Treena Thibodeau ESSAYS - N.S. Thompson, Christopher Rivas BOOK REVIEWS - Travis Biddick, Luke Hathaway, Matthew Buckley Smith POETRY - John Beaton, Bruce Bennett, Catharine Savage Brosman, Dan Campion, Richard Cecil, J.P. Celia, Terese Coe, Barbara Lydecker Crane, Anna M. Evans, David Galef, S.R. Graham, Julia Griffin, Elise Hempel, Vera Ignatowitsch, George Kalogeris, Garret Keizer, Quincy R. Lehr, Amit Majmudar, Eileen Malone, Tim McGrath, Susan McLean, Estill Pollock, Anne Delana Reeves, Rainer Maria Rilke, J.C. Scharl, David Southward, Wendy Videlock, Marly Youmans

Able Muse, Winter 2020/21 (No. 28 - print edition): a review of poetry, prose & art (Able Muse, Print Edition)

Pepple, Alexander

Essays & Correspondence

Able Muse Press

Able Muse, Winter 2022/23 (No. 30 - print edition): a review of poetry, prose & art (Able Muse, Print Edition)

Salter, Mary Jo

Le, Jenna

Brodeur, Brian

Rogoff, Jay

Campion, Dan

Glynn, Amy

Staples, Natalie

World Too Loud to Hear: Poems

Bachelor Pad is Stephen Kampa's second collection of poems. Where Kampa's first collection wrestled with silence and how to fill it, his second addresses solitude. By turns moving and funny, the poems in this book explore various permutations of intimacy and isolation in contemporary culture, juxtaposing them with other models of intimacy and fruitful solitude. The collection is divided into three sections. ""Around Town"" focuses on relationships in the public sphere: bars, parties, restaurants, and the give-and-(more often)-take that happen in them. ""Sleepless with Reruns"" is a mixed suite of poems that deals with both the movies on late-night television and those private movies that loop through the speaker's head when he lies awake in bed. ""At Home"" collects poems about home not only as a place, but also as an idea, placing particular emphasis not on the homes we come from but the ones we make. Throughout, poetic craft provides a vehicle for a transcendence that is part faith, part laughter. Stephen Kampa was born in Missoula, Montana, in 1981 and grew up in Daytona Beach, Florida.

Bachelor Pad

The Waywiser Press

Poetry. A collection that encompasses the Garden of Eden ("Something for Everything") and the end of the world ("Have It, Eat It"), ARTICULATE AS RAIN is an omnium-gatherum of tones, themes, prosodies, and poetic ploys. With characteristic comedy and surprising darkness, Stephen Kampa explores the relational aspects of our lives-love, faith, metaphysics, our civic selves-while revelling in the ranginess of the English language and in the music of its metrics. Yet for all its variety, this book reminds readers that countless raindrops can belong to the same storm."What first impresses and finally astounds in Stephen Kampa's new collection is the unflagging richness of his invention and virtuosity of his execution, the way in which technical precision allows him to speak to us in an amazing variety of registers. We are privy to existential dilemmas and prone to collapsing in helpless laughter, sometimes on the same page. As was said of Ovid, Stephen does not know when to stop. Good for him and good for us." —Charles Martin"ARTICULATE AS RAIN, Stephen Kampa's latest collection, moves crisply between registers, sounding out 'the revelations / of rhythm' by which a man measures his life. Whether his subject is a tropical cyclone or an overflowing toilet, Kampa renders it with precision and wit, and each poem's intricate architecture expands or contracts to suit the occasion. Elegant, wise, and resolutely tender, these are songs of experience, and Stephen Kampa is a masterful singer." —Caki Wilkinson"Stephen Kampa's poems can 'count the seconds, click by weighted click, / As though they were the tumblers to a safe,' until what has been locked away in darkness-the musings of our moral and ethical lives-is revealed. His classically poised verses make a winningly modern music, and his recurring themes (also classical!) of lust and booze, culture shocks and attenuated verities have never been fresher. Ask Kampa's tattoo artist for the skinny: 'Fate, circumstances, physics, God-will pierce you / More times than you can count.' This book is a boon!" —David Yezzi

Articulate as Rain

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Kampa, Stephen. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Kampa, Stephen