Catch of the Night, by Kathryn Paulsen

Poetry, chapbook, 40 pages, from Bottlecap Features.

Catch of the Night begins with a sleeping cloud waking, after which the author asks her brain for “something to write down first thing in the morning”—that is, for a dream.

The author is a passionate dreamer, whose writings have been much influenced by her dreams over the years. Many of these poems speak to the desire for a robust dream-life, the need to remember and record dreams, the ways of doing so, and the possibilities presented by sharing dreams with others.

Some poems recount or are inspired by specific episodes in dreams, or dream language. Among these: the author watching herself in bed with a sister, while another sister “wanders into this dream like a ghost”; touching the moon; being in a mental institution; exchanging bad puns at a cocktail party; the promise of being served the sky at a Dadaist restaurant; drinking from a fountain of ink; riding a big fish; and walking on the backs of fish …

          Scales like daggers
          making us bleed

Kathryn Paulsen’s poetry and prose have appeared in publications from Canada to Ireland to Australia, including New Letters, The New York Times, The Stinging Fly, Humber Literary Review, Scum, Craft, London Reader, Spillway. and Big Fiction. She also writes novels, stage plays, and screenplays and earned an MFA in film at Columbia University. Kathryn has been awarded fellowships at Yaddo, MacDowell, and other retreats. She lives in New York City but, having grown up in an Air Force family, has roots in many places.