Chronicity
Michael J. Leach's debut poetry collection is a chapbook of science- and health-related poems called 'Chronicity' (ISBN: 9780648967910). This book was published in 2020 by Melbourne Poets Union, as part of its Red-bellied Poets Series for new poets. To buy a copy of Chronicity, contact Hamish Danks Brown at Melbourne Poets Union: hamishdanksbrown@gmail.com
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Chronicity has been favourably reviewed by Magdalena Ball for Compulsive Reader
(http://www.compulsivereader.com/2021/05/22/a-review-of-chronicity-by-michael-j-leach/) and Travis Chi Wing Lau for US journal Synapsis: A Health Humanities Journal (https://medicalhealthhumanities.com/2021/07/12/the-poetics-of-chronicity-review/).
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During a Compulsive Reader Talks podcast, Michael reads four poems from Chronicity and talks poetry with Magdalena Ball:
https://anchor.fm/compulsivereader/episodes/Michael-J-Leach-on-Chronicity-e11de4o
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A number of poets have provided testimonials for this chapbook.
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"Michael J. Leach’s Chronicity moves us conceptually and emotionally through experiences of chronic pain, with the accuracy of a scientist and the wisdom of a poet. Diagnosing maladies of bone, blood and brain, this collection presents a dazzling poetry pillbox filled with contemplative remedies for our troubles."
—A/Prof. Jessica L. Wilkinson
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"Chronicity is a collection that hovers on the borderlands of science and the soul. It weaves logic with emotion, and knowledge with wisdom. It is a shapeshifter, taking us on the eight minute and 20 second journey of invisible cosmic travellers of energy arriving on the earth across the cosmos, or following a paracetamol tablet as it enters the gut and dissolves into the bloodstream...It implores us that a more interdisciplinary, holistic approach is needed to truly begin to understand and save our world."
—Dr Leah Kaminsky
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"Science and poetry met in a bold visual display in Michael J. Leach’s Chronicity."
—Dr Tina Giannoukos
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"I thoroughly recommend this book. It’s astute, thoughtful, intelligent, arresting & nuanced."
—Tru S. Dowling
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“Art & Matter, Medicine & Light are here expressed as interchangeable endeavours. Excited electrons gripped in a magnetic field, the poems Leach generates are manifest as emotionally charged waveforms.”
—Dr Tim Metcalf
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