Ask Me About the Future
by Rebecca Jessen

‘If you wanted to know about the future you wouldn’t expect a neat response would you? Ask Me About the Future’s surprising and sure reinventions of form are one version of the future, and so are its class-tinged mini non-linear narratives. Jessen’s poems explode with multiplicity and humour, but also take quiet times out. Queer can be brash, sure, but there are other tones and structures: borrowed from apparent enemies – and Netflix. You won’t know the answer till the end.’

‘sk Me About the Future is a book that offers up queer life as found poetry, lines from songs, love like a cut made deep and long. Jessen’s writing is a heart split open, a fist held close, the body always surfacing.’

‘Loaded with essential contemporary elements, Rebecca Jessen’s poems are the work of a skilful bricoleur – found poems, erasures, a cento, micro prose and recombinations. Her content includes horoscopes, Netflix, dating apps, pop stars, the royal ballet, art exhibitions, sad and sexy queer love, domestic scenes and family crisis. Shadowed by a chronic emptiness – “driving cars worth more than your self-esteem” – the poet pursues diagnosis and cure. Often funny, reality tv is détourned to a lesbian bachelorette and in “Vote Yes”, “a pineapple is not a piña colada just because it wants to be”. This assured, eclectic, compassionate book is on a mission, not only to a speculative futuristic utopia of queerness, but is also chasing a reconciliation “with the grief of gender”. It’s spirited, astute and totally up-to-date.’