The first release of Piżama Press!

Poems by Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi

102 pages

Publication date: May 27, 2025

Cover art by Matthew Revert

Illustrations by Gautam Rangan

About the Author

Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi is a novelist, poet, and educator. His debut novel, 2019’s The Book of Kane and Margaret (FC2/ UAP), received a positive review from Publishers Weekly, who called it a “beautifully rendered reflection on a dark moment of American history,” while acclaimed author Jeff VanderMeer said the novel was “one of my favorite reads of this or any year,” and author Lucy Corin added that it was “an abundance of astonishments. It’s not just a great debut, it’s a great book.” You can find more at www.kiikak.com.

About the Book

Disintegration Made Plain and Easy is the debut poetry collection from Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi. In this book, you will find surreal, absurd, dreamspeak poems full of humor, autobiographical mistruths, pop culture references, and heartfelt abstractions. With poems previously featured in Washington Square, Action Yes, Electric Lit, Your Impossible Voice, and many others, this 100 page book comes complete with line art illustrations from Gautam Rangan.

Advance Praise

"It's so damn hot in these poems! Celebrities and children cheek-by-jowl, snails and donkeys, all the mutant sonnets coming out of their mouths. All the salty grass. The ghosts. The anal clam meats. Who is Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi? Did he dissolve his face in these poems? Did he drink the whole hose of language? The whole hog? I go weak when I read Kiik's book. I want to lie down on each creepy good page."

- Joanna Ruocco

Excerpt

a prose poem from the book, disguised as a fake bio (originally appearing in Electric Lit)

about the author

Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi’s first book of poems made no impact whatsoever. Critics were not pleased by it saying we have no knowledge or record of her whatsoever. Kiik usually is a man. Unless no record exists in which case he is a woman. She was winner of the Haemophiliacs Hospital Raffle. Kiik lives here in this room. When you switch off the lights he comes in through the window and eats out of the garbage. Because he’s eaten the garbage seven years it is molecularly accurate if you say Kiik is mostly water garbage. When the lights come on Kiik deflates and he crawls inside this tiny box. A pupa wraps its mitten of fur around the word. The mouth of flour rubs its ghost over the flute. The angel of steam raises its palm flush to the barrel.

About the Illustrator

Gautam Rangan is an illustrator, animator, and interaction designer living in Los Angeles. He spent 8 years making media systems & visual content for massive water features at WET Design, for example light shows projected onto a 5 story tall circular waterfall at the Jewel building in Singapore. You can find more at www.gautamrangan.com.