Addertje

Jolanda Kooijmans received a contribution for Addertje: a collection of poems featuring three long, thrill-seeking poems driven by none other than the bearded devil. The devil who becomes flesh in the brave demon Addertje, the devil who takes possession of the singing girl Zuuz, the devil who lives under the skirts of heerneef Bubblebeez. Addertje is a hybrid collection about fear, cruelty, getting lost in the world and crossing a critical boundary - topical data in this time of confusion, moral emptiness and increasing aggression. In spite of the pitch-black subject matter, the poems are lyrical, thought-provoking and highly sensitive. Each poem has its own voice, its own language, and the language is wonderfully light.

Jolanda is a lyrical poet and visual artist. She writes and paints to "tickle the soul awake," to see and (perhaps) understand the world again and again with a waking, open mind. Her field of work is the delicate, meaningful and sometimes dark layer beneath our everyday experiences, our environments and our language. In all her lucidity and lightness, she works on a deep emotional level, with a fine and sharp sense of humor and a richness of forms. In 2020 her debut collection TWO TON was published, in which the world of De Peel (where she lived) is the common thread, and then both the nature of this mysterious swamp and the all-pervading bio-industry. She has published poems with De Revisor, Ooteoteote, Deus ex Machina, KONTmagazine and in various anthologies. Besides being a poet, Jolanda is a painter and installation artist; a quartermaster in all fields, a pioneer who refuses to stay on the path, gets lost, but always comes back.