Dispatches from Bohemian Splendor
Judson writes regularly on Substack, in his publication Dispatches from Bohemian Splendor. Click here to access it.
Like A Bird Knows To Sing
Like A Bird Knows To Sing- click here to buy it
Like A Bird Knows To Sing is Judson Vereen's second collection of poetry. Most of the poems were written in the state of Minas Gerais, Brasil. Dedicated to his wife, the author describes the work as a form of meditation- being far away from his native country after having found a new life and a new calm in the countryside of Brasil.
American Pleasure
DEBUT NOVEL. American Pleasure is a psycho-sexual first person narrative by American artist Judson Vereen. Set in San Francisco, the work explores exactly one year of the writer's various personal struggles within a rapidly changing city. Judson is a high school drop out resigned to inner city bohemia. He gives a tell-all account of his various bouts with addiction, financial insecurity, and uncontrollable sexual impulses, all while pursuing his training as an EMT, his “only salvation”. His struggles are exacerbated when he becomes romantically entangled with the magnetic Lindsay Larson, a local budding Adult film star. The author falls in love with Lindsay, just as she gains notoriety in the world of hardcore pornography and extreme disgrace sex, throwing him into a whirlwind of turmoil, desperation, and obsession. The author reveals thoughts on various themes ranging from urban vice, sexual humiliation, and recovery. The book is a reflection of the turbulent times in which it was written. Graphic content. Strong sexual themes. This is a debut novel.
American Pleasure – book review
July Westhale
"I want to keep this forever. Alas, a new day has already begun." These two sentences, situated well into the narrative of a protagonist obsessed with a woman, a city, and an idea, very well may be the subtitle of this novel.
However, to reduce the novel to the idea of obsession, or archive, is to do the writing (and writer) a great disservice; "American Pleasure" is far more than your standard, post-Beat elegy to the City by the Bay. For one, it centers San Francisco as a legitimate character who is every bit as ornery, every bit as tender, every bit as sexy as the actually, flesh-and-blood characters--most Beat and post-Beat (and the reason I'm creating the juxtaposition here is because scant few Northern Californian narratives seem to exist post-Ginsberg that aren't trying--and largely failing--to emulate the famous style) literature actually just positions the city as a foil for whatever deviant activities the protagonist is up to.
Rather, "American Pleasure" seems to get inside of obsession, orienting it in a specific place and a specific time (which seems all the more timely, as the fortress in question, The Armory, was just recently sold), and push the walls and horizons outward. The woman in question is most definitely fetishized, most definitely held up to impossible standards of beauty/performance/morality--however, where a lesser novel would just let the fetish ruin everything for feminist readers, the protagonist in this novel actually seems to acknowledge his own shortcomings, and that, readers, makes all the difference.
62 poems from Judson Vereen
"62" is a collection of poems and writings by Judson Vereen that covers a time span of approximately six years. Included in this short compendium are works conceived in the cities of New York, Atlanta, and briefly San Francisco. This collection sums up the writer's main concerns involving love and eroticism, the state of a young modern individual, and selections from "Bed-Stuy Solitude", celebrating the Brooklyn neighborhood.
62 Poems from Judson Vereen – book review
Yasmin Vereen
People often romanticize young poets, and the appeal is quite clear: there is something special about being so new, so bursting with feeling - almost pure in the way they conduct themselves and express their inner worlds. What there may in Judson Vereen's "62 poems" goes beyond anything that can be put in such expected words; there is a level of depth, a degree of skepticism in Vereen’s collection that escapes any of these clichés.
There is pain in many of his words. But there is also light. Lightness and darkness dance beautifully all over this compendium made by the artist in his teenage years. Many of the poems are short and fleeting - everything about “62” seems to have a sense of urgency, but hardly the one we usually associate with youth; it is an urge to live fully, to devour and elaborate complex feelings about being a creative person that loves intensely, makes art incessantly and struggles to understand his role in the world we live in - a world whose rules clearly never made any sense to the author. His declarations to former lovers are passionate, and so is the way his words are directed to friends, cities, and anything that captures the attention and the heart of the artist.
Following Vereen's career as a whole, it is noticeable that the inclination to cause extreme and strong reactions seems to come pretty easy to his artistic self. But there is no point here in separating the artist and the man, or, in the case of “62”, the boy: such a personal work deserves to be appreciated under a personal, intimate light. And here lies the strength of "62": personal excavation. The self-exploration and expression of raw feelings and thoughts made by the artist as a young man come with such honesty about who he is and where he wishes to be. The poetry you will find here vibrates with beautiful and sometimes uncomfortable truths - and while this compendium is brief, it serves as a rewarding introduction to the work of a restless artist.
62 poemas de Judson Vereen - Versão em português
"62" cobre um período de aproximadamente seis anos de poemas e outros escritos de Judson Vereen. Os trabalhos foram concebidos nas cidades de Nova Iorque, Atlanta e brevemente São Francisco. A coleção sintetiza alguns dos principais temas de interesse de Vereen, incluindo amor e erotismo, o estado em que se encontra o jovem moderno, e também uma seleção intitulada "Solidão de Bed-Stuy", uma série que celebra o famoso bairro do Brooklyn, Nova Iorque.