Riding home

the long version

Is it possible to be hypercritical of our social circumstance at the end of our century without recourse to the logical formalisms of the postmodern tool kit? Is it possible, in fact, that this tool kit is part of the problem? In what sense can we make sense of common-sense in the language of colloquialisms? Where is "home"? How do we get there from here? What makes "home" different from the everyday, working world that surrounds it, beleaguers it, oppresses it, intrudes on it? When we go riding home, are we riding away from somewhere, are we riding toward somewhere, or are we riding through somewhere? Are the rules at home different from those operating in the workplace, in the economy, in politics, and if so, what is the nature of that difference? . While Riding Home concerns itself with all of these questions, Helen Potrebenko resolutely refuses to address these issues in anything other than the spare concisions of her poetic texts. She describes this book as "a bunch of poems." The work is all there is left to say.