Rapid Transit
Rapid Transit
Published by Nomadic Press as a part of the 2018 Spring Chapbook collection.
Rapid Transit is a humorous and poignant romp down the rusting tracks of American public transit, filled with haunting and colorful characters—those we wish to embrace, run from, those we see ourselves reflected in. It begs the question: do we ever truly reach our destinations?
"These 'stories about commuting' straddle the line between poetry and memoir, and do so exceedingly well, thanks to Naughton’s gifts of concision and depth. It’s not easy living with other people at any time, but especially not on the buses, streetcars, and BART trains of the San Francisco Bay Area. A gross guy could plop himself down next to you just as easy as a hot one. And always the smell of vomit to usher in your morning and see out your evening—with work in between. The book’s forte is the poet’s ability to see through the built-in dirt of mass transit, into something of splendor and solidarity, a consciousness of the value of 'infrastructure.' Muriel Rukeyser, the Bay Area’s got a new poet hero—young, like you were, and ever hopeful."
– Kevin Killian