Powered by lush imagery and lyricism, the poems in 'The Sleep of Four Cities' use the city as a metaphor for the complexity of self. This book invites the reader to take a journey through multiple cities-cities of memory, of desire, of imagination, of discovery, of loss-with only the map of language as a guide. The cities in this book are not always easily unlocked-they are at once tangible and invisible; they exist both inside and outside the speakers of the poems. Throughout the book, these speakers seek to discover what is within their grasp and what, like water, will slip through their fingers.

"Currin's poetry attends us, lighting the ball at midnight, where first love and first terror are arm-in-arm, waiting in their figurative, gesticulating disguises to welcome us to a primitive happiness." - Rain Taxi

Poems by Jen Currin have appeared in numerous North American journals, including: The Fiddlehead, Mudfish, The Massachusetts Review, Diner, subTerrain, The Mississippi Review, and Washington Square. In 2002, Mark Levine awarded her second place in River City's annual poetry contest. Her chapbook Ten Poems/Eleven Years was published by Breeds Like A Rumrunner (Vancouver, 2004). Her most recent collection, Hagiography, won Winnow Press's 2005 Open Book Award. A graduate of Bard College and Arizona State University's MFA program, Jen currently teaches creative writing at the Vancouver Film School and for Langara College's Continuing Education program. While at ASU, she served as both assistant editor and poetry editor of Hayden's Ferry Review from 1999-2002. Born and raised in Portland, Oregon, Jen currently lives in Vancouver, BC, where she is a member of the poetry collective vertigo west.

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