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The Operating Theater
Here the patient becomes surgeon, opening up his own flesh to peer within and show the spectators what lurks beneath the skin of our secret hearts. Here there is a constant risk of bleeding out in view of a myriad of onlookers. Here is the way of death and madness. In The Operating Theater, the only way to healing is through self-evisceration. (From the back cover.)
- GenresPoetry
65 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2015
34 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 6, 2018
Sonorous verses, mercurial in red and white, coax tears of saline and of damage. Life is bedlam and life is grief, but destiny holds no acrimony. "It really will be all right. It cannot be otherwise." Harrowing and beautiful.
January 12, 2018
The hardest part of this little review will be finding the adjectives intense enough to describe how this collection of poetry made me feel. Personally, what I loved about it is how much passion was conveyed within the pages: vivid, honest, and gracefully done. I had intended to list favorites below, but realized that it is pointless to do so when about 80% of these were not only good, but good enough that my eyes were wide, in awe as they concluded. If any of what I have written describes something you might enjoy, I strongly recommend you read the Operating Theater.
October 16, 2016
The poems in The Operating Theater dissect with unflinching clarity what it means to be human; a human who feels too much. It’s a condition that constantly breaks down like-minded souls, yet we find a way to push through, rise above the waterline, gulp fresh air…before dipping back down into the depths of pain. These poems are raw, extremely visceral (“Holy Father Violation�), devastatingly heartbreaking (“The Right Time to Move On�), and even brutally fucked up, guilt-driven, no reason spared, all reason splayed open, all contemplation laced with poisonous self-emasculation (“The Loser Manifesto: Notes From Dirt”—really, this one’s hard to read, more an uncomfortable experience like…like remember the first time you saw David Lynch’s Blue Velvet and Frank Booth came on and placed the oxygen mask over his face and…yeah, that’s the kind of discomfort wired into this one). Much of this poetry acknowledges a religious/spiritual foundation, and much of it is apparently born of autobiographical experiences.
Whew! After reading this collection, I am emotionally wasted, and gleefully so. Gleefully? Yes, because when art digs this deep, there’s a kind of understanding, a pact made with readers willing to go along for the ride: we are here and we hurt, but we find strength in our art, and in those who are brave enough to never turn away, no matter how deep the blade slices into the soul of existence.
Whew! After reading this collection, I am emotionally wasted, and gleefully so. Gleefully? Yes, because when art digs this deep, there’s a kind of understanding, a pact made with readers willing to go along for the ride: we are here and we hurt, but we find strength in our art, and in those who are brave enough to never turn away, no matter how deep the blade slices into the soul of existence.
March 2, 2016
This is a haunting, chilling, frightening, heartbreaking collection of poetry. There are jarring confessionals, moments where you looking through the eyes of a serial killer, ruminations on sexual depravity which read like pages from the marquis de Sade's diary, and tender meditations on love and loss that blaze like a naked light bulb; unfiltered, unshaded. The collection itself is like that, though, there is nothing between you and narrator, you experience it all, the sweat, sex, blood, tears, want, pain, loss, and anger all come through in poetry which invokes in equal parts the visceral and the numinous. I look forward eagerly to new work from this writer, he is clearly a force to be reckoned with.
June 9, 2016
When I received my copy of Christopher Ropes' The Operating Theater in the mail, and had time to savor the contents, it struck me that its appearance in the contemporary wasteland of disposable reading matter just might be on a par with the mysterious arrival of such works as "The Waste Land and Other Poems" or "Howl" in another era. Many scribblers of trivial verse operate today, whether following in the well-tramped footsteps of neoformalists or the drunken grandstanding of would-be Bukowksi's. Ropes shows not only a true appreciation for his literary forebears but a synthesis and reintegration of their innovations, from Eliot to Berryman and Dickinson to Plath. Like his confederate at Dynatox Ministries Philip LoPresti, Ropes can sound like a howling madman, but it's a howl with all the right aesthetic echoes. Enjoy the ring of true crystal Ropes sounds and treat yourself to The Operating Theater.
April 16, 2016
Lie down on the cot, freshly snapped into place by the poet. Open the curtains and become a spectator of the show known as "The Operating Theater."
Ropes has poetry in his veins, pulsating into description of; Murder, Occult, Loss Loved Ones and Rage. All penned into words that flows out of a slit wrist trickling down the index finger mixing with the ink to explain ones mind in such vivid passages. As the poet says it, "the only way to healing is through self-evisceration." and its folded into this book of poetry. RECOMMENDED!!
My Favorites:
-Berryman's Ghost
-The Right Time to Move On
-The Waiting Room
-Cana
-Baptism
-Diabolism (For Eileen Mary Jones Ropes 5/10/44 - 11/7/99)
Ropes has poetry in his veins, pulsating into description of; Murder, Occult, Loss Loved Ones and Rage. All penned into words that flows out of a slit wrist trickling down the index finger mixing with the ink to explain ones mind in such vivid passages. As the poet says it, "the only way to healing is through self-evisceration." and its folded into this book of poetry. RECOMMENDED!!
My Favorites:
-Berryman's Ghost
-The Right Time to Move On
-The Waiting Room
-Cana
-Baptism
-Diabolism (For Eileen Mary Jones Ropes 5/10/44 - 11/7/99)
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
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