Short Leash Kept On, Candace Hill-Montgomery

Short Leash Kept On is a long poem, written in late 2022 by multi-disciplinary artist and writer Candace Hill-Montgomery. With illustrations from the author, the book concerns the artist's “passion for crime, my own type of detecting, detectives and whatever pops into my head", laced with a deep dive into the poetry of Lloyd Addison, Russell Atkins, and the work of artist Tom Feelings. A dizzying and dazzling work, flying in on torrents of invention like a Cecil Taylor solo or the careening cadences and limber lineages of the known and unknown poets of the Black Radical Tradition.

    “not I bud and blossom not I
    looking glass thoughtless not I
    said the bosom not I said to
    seek not I in too deep not I drivel
    thirst not I keep it coming
    nonetheless”

A5 Perfectbound
206 pages

About the author 

Weaver, multi-disciplinary artist, worker with words, writer extraordinaire, Candace Hill (aka Candace Hill-Montgomery) was born and raised in Queens, New York. In the 1970s and 1980s, she studied at Fordham University and Hunter College; in 1979, she was artist-in-residence at the Studio Museum in Harlem and exhibited her work at Artists Space. She was awarded a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1981, and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1985. Since then, she has exhibited widely, making public installations, publishing artists books, and curating exhibitions across New York and internationally. Today, she resides in Bridgehampton, Suffolk County, and has recently exhibited at the Sag Harbor Whaling & Historical Museum.