Systems Thinking with Flowers - Krystal Languell

A poetry collection about conspiring to do right within the constraints of inherited structures, Systems Thinking with Flowers critiques unearned authority in its many guises. In two sections, the book chronicles the complex emotional gymnastics required for existence in male-dominated and colonialist environments, such as professional sports, museums, and other institutions.

The first section zeroes in on Major League Baseball, referencing specific players and teams as the poems consider the ways in which the spectator is implicated by the stadium environment. Constant advertising is a given (the eighth inning is brought to you by Kars for Kids), but fans can do the trick of seeing it and seeing past it.

While the second section of the collection wanders away from sports, the poems find the same capitalist and racist logics undergirding settings such as gas stations, art museums, and the workplace. “Fatigued with proving my merit nightly,” the speaker in this book longs for a reprieve that does not come. “My gritty leather death event goes all kaput.” Under such circumstances, any activity outside the cash economy may build a new world bit by bit.

Systems Thinking is a human resources concept that honors the complexity of human behavior by suggesting that workplace challenges should be addressed holistically. It is the opposite of whack-a-mole. And while you’re at it, get some fresh flowers. Enjoy your life. You’re worth it.

Chosen by Rae Armantrout, Systems Thinking with Flowers was the winner of the 2019 Fonograf Editions Open Genre Book Prize. Volume Foreword by Rae Armantrout.

About Krystal Languell

Krystal Languell lives in Chicago. She is the author of three previous books of poetry: Call the Catastrophists (BlazeVox, 2011), Gray Market (1913 Press, 2016), and Quite Apart (University of Akron Press, 2019). Additionally, she has published six chapbooks, including Diamonds in the Flesh, a collaboration with Robert Alan Wendeborn, (Double Cross Press, 2015) and Archive Theft, a collection of interviews, (Essay Press, 2015).

She has received residencies and fellowships from The Poetry Project, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Vermont Studio Center.

For ten years, she helped coordinate the activities of Belladonna* Collaborative and has published the feminist poetry journal Bone Bouquet since 2010. She held many titles while working as an adjunct in New York City for seven years, including finally Adjunct Associate Professor in the Department of Humanities & Media Studies at Pratt Institute. 

Languell earned a BA from Indiana University and an MFA from New Mexico State University.