Against a clear blue sky, a pair of men’s hands, not quite entwined, stretch upward while the wrists are tight against each other. Above the hands the text in white says: Mute / The Fifteenth Anniversary Edition / Raymond Luczak.

MUTE: The Fifteenth Anniversary Edition

Do not be afraid of your face.

Move into a beam of light

in the bar. Smile openly.

Watch his hands move

quicker than strobe lights

as he surveys the crowd with his friends.

Do…

MUTE: The Fifteenth Anniversary Edition →

The two-toned book cover (dark teal and dark gold) shows a young white boy with a bowl haircut in a two-toned t-shirt looking at us in a black-and-white photograph. He is standing on a street and holding onto a two-toned girls’ bicycle in front of an undeveloped lot of trees and tall grasses. Near the top of the cover is the text in white: IRONHOOD: poems. Near the bottom right corner of the cover is the author’s name in dark rust: RAYMOND LUCZAK.

Ironhood: Poems

In Ironhood, the acclaimed poet Raymond Luczak recalls the neighbors and shopkeepers he once knew while growing up in Ironwood, Michigan during the 1970s and 1980s. They included a scruffy man who smoked cheap cigars while tending to his fragrant backyard garden, a cat-eyed woman who stood watch over a sea of typewriters, a bald jeweler whose dexterous fingers repaired a watch’s minuscule innards, and tired cashiers in red smocks who dreamed at the
western edge of town.

Ironhood: Poems →

The Latest

Featured Book Trailer

IRONHOOD: "The Watchdog"

Ironhood: Poems →


“…Raymond Luczak again provides us with the life-sustaining exploration of Deaf and queer life that has characterized all his work…about the importance of connecting with others, pushing through loneliness and fear to the joy that comes from discovering and sustaining community.”

Robert McRuer, author of Crip Theory: Cultural Signs of Queerness and Disability

black and white image of Raymond Luczak with a beard, glancing at the side

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The Author

News & Interviews

Peruse Raymond’s latest news, appearances, and interviews below.

Selected Press →

a bearded Raymond Luczak glancing sideways wearing a plaid shirt
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