Big Bruiser Dope Boy - It's hurt shit. A laugh that ends with a turned head and a teary eye. Each poem sings for lost unknowns to come home. It's funny, straightforward, absurd, sad, and, ultimately, true in the way that only art can be

Big Bruiser Dope Boy, Something Gross,

Apocalypse Party, 2021.

 "This genre-defying account (novel? narrative poem?) of the troubled love of a young man for an emotionally stunted older one in the bars and apartments of megalopolitan Denver is written with such a spooking purity of line and with such an audaciously stark, grave wisdom that it already feels like a classic of its kind. Big Bruiser Dope Boy’s undecorated, indecorous sentences cut right through you and into the soul you might not have even known you still had. Something Gross is his most triumphant book yet. You are sure to wish you had written it." — Garielle Lutz

Nathaniel Kennon Perkins: Do you expect your readers to “understand” your work? Does that matter?

Big Bruiser Dope Boy: I don’t know what there is to understand in my work. The words are there and the reader reads the words and they have that experience. If a reader feels they understand my work, or understands something from my work, then that is their understanding that they have. People are trained to be shallow consumers of simple, entertainment-oriented art. They want to understand. They want there to be a purpose, a point, a meaning, and become frustrated and feel as if their time is being wasted when they can’t find one, dissatisfied with a lack of distraction.

NKP: Tell me about the history and vision of Gay Death Trance.

BBDB: I wanted to start a website that looks good to me and publish writing on it that I like. Giacomo Pope, the guy who created Neutral Spaces, helped me design it and taught me how to do the basic HTML necessary to add work. There will be t-shirts soon, courtesy of Steve Anwyll.

NKP: What living poets, early in their careers, do you admire and recommend people read?

BBDB: I don’t admire or recommend people read living poets with careers.

https://denniscooperblog.com/5-books-i-read-recently-loved-mike-corrao-rituals-performed-in-the-absence-on-ganymede-ursula-andkjaer-olsen-outgoing-vessel-big-bruiser-dope-boy-something-gross-susana-thenon-ova-completa-rikk/

Big Bruiser Dope Boy, Foghorn Leghorn, Clash

Books, 2019. 

excerpt

The voice of this book. It has everything I want and yet I really can't explain it. It's hurt shit. A laugh that ends with a turned head and a teary eye. Each poem sings for lost unknowns to come home. It's funny, straightforward, absurd, sad, and, ultimately, true in the way that only art can be. Say hello to the gay Rodney Dangerfield. Say hello to the Boom Doctor. Say hello to your first real boyfriend. Join me in welcoming this new voice. The Big Bruiser Dope Boy. One of the new wolves. May he forever huff and puff. We will never escape his cartoon. —Sam Pink

Walking Through: https://www.philosophicalidiot.com/bigbruiserdopeboypoetry

Big Bruiser Dope Boy is the author of Foghorn Leghorn, Your First Real Boyfriend & Other Poems, and After Denver.