My Father in Water

My father hovers in the aperture of a glistening window suicide botched by his mother's ghost. Numbers from his slide rule pause on the sill fallen by chance into a brilliant formula. This interlinked collection of lyric essays documents Carol Guess's relationship to her father a brilliant scientist whose intensity and eccentricity shaped family life in humorous and often lonely ways. In musical prose writing as a poet teacher and queer activist Guess describes a life lived in service to language. At once accessible and enigmatic funny and somber My Father In Water is a haunting examination of the impact of family history on one artist's journey.