Sometimes, even in poetry, we need to take a step back and laugh at life。 Do you know how, with semantic satiation, a word becomes meaningless the more you say it? The repetition makes the word sound absurd。 Cohen's poems help give clarity to our absurd world。 Every day we "wash, rinse, repeat。" This book puts the cycle on hold, and we feel refreshed because of it。
Cat’s poetry is the perfect manifestation of her singular persona。 It’s outrageously funny, bold, unafraid, absurd, unadorned and somehow consistently profound。 I belly-laughed involuntarily throughout, was repeatedly moved, and mostly marveled at her deliciously unique voice。” —Ben Platt
“This book is a party & at the party you meet somebody who is hilarious & charming (but also hot & smart!) & the reason you’re together is because you’re both a little sad in a modern way plus the outlet is there & your phones are both at 12 percent。 After reading this I wrote seven million things I’ve always been meaning to but hadn’t yet because I felt I didn’t have permission & that is what these poems gave me: permission to be the freaky little bitch I’ve always been, searching endlessly for something more。” —Melissa Lozada-Oliva, author of Peluda
“Does anyone chronicle and lampoon millennial ennui as hilariously, as vulnerably and as bitingly as Cat Cohen? NFW TBH。 I’m a stan!” —Alan Cumming, author of Not My Father’s Son
poem I wrote after I told you I was empathetic
I go to the CVS on 14th & 8th and you’ve asked me not to contact you anymore one time you were having a smoothie like it was 1998
and there was nothing I could do about it your jawline is so perfect that I cannot stop telling you to kill me even though you said please stop asking me to kill you a leaf just fell outside my window remember when I tripped on the dance floor and that guy who always talked about Ibiza called me a fat whore?
I should have said I’m a leaf
I’m a leaf like I was in a play like I was in something bigger than my body
I can’t tell if my therapist is cool or just has short bangs
poem I wrote after I tried to write a tweet about sparkling water
I’ve got a disease where I haven’t watched an entire feature film since the aughts do you like how I said “aughts”?
you don’t see that every day!
I’ve never been to a sex party but one time I made fun of this girl for bringing deviled eggs to an event and then I ate six of them。
humiliation, satisfaction,
a long walk home in spring。
I love sex and I love before it—
the double vodka soda leg touch
Is it possible to miss everything at once?
poem I wrote after I had the strangest urge to
confide in dear friends beneath starlight
I just took a pregnancy test to feel alive and all I got was piss on my hands
I don’t think I’d take my daughter to get her nails done if I were a mother she can do that with her friends if she wants
I’d like to have kids at 35
so I can start wearing graceful linen sacks and calling everyone “darling”
I’d like to wear lipstick and lean on a built-in bookcase and tell you I like Helen Frankenthalther and did you know that’s her painting on the Renata Adler novel I told you to read the one I never finished because I needed to have sex with someone who lived on the Upper West Side can you grab some ice?
I like ice in my wine