Mummer Prisoner Scavenger Thief

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mummer: a person acting in a masked mime
prisoner: a person trapped by a set of circumstances
scavenger: a person who collects abandoned items
thief: a person who takes things by stealth, without force or violence

This collection begins in the realm of the mummer whose masked performance conceals the self and transforms language to better evoke what is too risky to speak overtly. Ransick’s poems ply this tension between knowing and speaking in cadence and imagery that simultaneously disorients readers and beckons them forward, in lines whose half-remembered music refuses to be predictable. The role of the shunned figures in the title is to draw poems out from the margins of experience, to reclaim voices muted by more powerful forces, an elusive goal only the best poetry can accomplish. Travel along with them as guides, ready to steal and scavenge what you need for your own escape.