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New! Romance in Twelve Lines

The linocut block in the foreground with two marked up test prints in the background and a small pile of linoleum scraps from editing the block.
Gold metallic printing ink rolled out on a glass inking slab and the ink-covered roller.
A large black Conrad etching press with ivory blankets flipped back sits in the print studio at Kennedy Press in Belfast, Maine, set up to print Bloof chapbook covers.
Several freshly printed covers for romance in twelve lines by Bruna Beber, translated by Sarah Rebecca Kersley, lying on a wire-shelved drying rack. The cover is dark gray with lettering and imagery printed in metallic gold, from a hand-carved linocut block.
The first sewn copy of romance in twelve lines by Bruna Beber, translated by Sarah Rebecca Kersley. A large eye with rays and three smaller icos of a cloud, a broken vase with wilted flower, and a flame are printed between the title and the author's name in metallic gold ink on dark gray paper.
Five copies of romance in twelve lines fanned out in my hand, showing the light reflecting on the metallic gold ink.

Bloof’s first release in the new year comes to us all the way from Brazil: Bruna Beber’s romance in twelve lines. We’ve been working as a guest printer over at Kennedy Press in Belfast, Maine to print up these covers from our hand-carved linoleum block in gold metallic ink on wrought iron gray paper.

This sequence of poems appears in both English translation by Sarah Rebecca Kersley and in the original Portuguese in the chapbook’s second section. As the titular relationship tumbles through its inevitable phases, Beber’s imagery shifts from the giddy tick tock of anticipation into days of “doubts and lilies” and metaphorically overdrawn accounts. We’ve all been there, and this handful of poems captures each point in love’s arc in deeply observed detail.

Chapbooks are in stock—take a look back at the process of printing and assembling them on Instagram—and are limited to 150 hand-sewn copies. Orders are shipping now, and you can mix and match it in your own custom chapbook bundle. You’ll also find copies at our partner bookstores like Woodland Pattern in Milwaukee, Grolier Poetry Bookshop in Cambridge, and Open Books in Seattle!