Nights of Naked Mannequins - Paperback

by Michael Lee Phillips (Author)

This book of poems, Nights of Naked Mannequins, begins in 1965 - the year that the birth control pill was legalized in every state and the '60's sexual revolution really got going. The poems start with the lustful speaker fumbling his way to the back seat boudoir of a 1956 Chevy and proceed, poem by poem, to tell a testosterone-laden tale of lust and longing on one man's journey to - so he hopes - a mature, yet still erotic, understanding and appreciation of his life. The author has indicated that the poems are Noir poems - Noir because the voice comes from a darker side of poetry - bluntly erotic and lurid, where laws of state might not be broken but where a heart can be arrested, convicted and imprisoned for crimes committed by desire. In Nights of Naked Mannequins the speaker of the poems becomes his own erotic private detective, investigating the truth about his sensual past. Always surprised at what he finds. Sexually explicit, often sensual, sometimes humorous, occasionally cynical, even sentimental - poems you might overhear in a bar in Del Rio, Texas, just before you slip off to find the cheapest motel. Poems to read when a particular song starts to haunt you. The song that you heard first at Coachella, Lollapalooza, maybe even Glastonbury - where the guitar player broke a string while staring at the girl you came with, the one who pulled her hand away every time you reached for it.

Author Biography

Michael Lee Phillips was born in Trona, California. When he was very young, his family moved to a desert canyon not far from Death Valley, where they lived at a gold mine. Eventually, he attended Fresno State College. Following that, he worked as a janiotor, newspaper reporter, feature editor, photographer and teacher. Except for extended periods of time residing in Ireland and Greece, he lives in California.