Charles Simic - Nine Poems
Nine Poems
By Charles Simic
24 page, 9” x 13” oversized chapbook with heavy orange dust jacket.
Shrink-wrapped, mint condition.
Printed in an edition of 500 copies, 1989.
The first Exact Change book, 1989; a chapbook, subtitled “A Childhood Story.” First edition of poems later republished in trade collections.
From the 20th Anniversary Catalogue (see About page):
“We also gave copies [of our zine] to our favorite teachers. One — Charles Simic — gave us a book in return. A book to print. Now what to do? Charles Simic is a great writer. And when a great writer gives you a book to print… you start a publishing house.
“It was 1989, by then we were in graduate school, and we had continued our wanderings but as part of a rock band, Galaxie 500. We knew a lot of small record labels, run by people more or less our age and with no more resources or knowhow. Why not do the same, but with books? The name of our little magazine still seemed to fit the spirit of the enterprise. And so Charles Simic’s 9 Poems became the first Exact Change book, edited by Damon Krukowski and designed by Naomi Yang.”