“I Know A Man” appears in Democracy Is Not For The People (2012)
First thing you'll notice about this poem: it's funny. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be a difference between poets and comedians, but it does seem like comedians are the experts at telling the truth slant with a hook, doesn't it? "If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you," yeah? (Don't let any poet who can't make you laugh make you cry.)
Reading it, you'll notice quickly that the theme of Josef's work is violence, the ethics, politics, and representation of violence, and what poetry can do with it. And, as with violence itself, whether you laugh or cry about it is mostly a function of distance -- how much attention you're paying, how seriously you take it.
Some of his work registers as pure horror, the kind that sinks your day and haunts you. Some of it explores the affect of anti-capitalism far past the point of resignation, pursuing it into exciting and dangerous imaginary territory. Some of it's possibly too controversial for public consumption. And some of it is gleefully overwrought yarns about the guy from Jackass running over the President, and it was this uncomfortable crucifixion on the axes of horror and humor that I needed, back in 2012, to make me give a shit about poetry again.
“Violent and hectic and wise.”
