In the poem "Nada," Charles Harper Webb writes, "But my gift was making fun of things." Indeed, this gets to the core of Webb's poetry — he's a real wisecracker whose poems shimmer with wit. As the title of this collection, Brain Camp, suggests, Webb's poems are all about a lively mind at play.

The eponymous poem, "Brain Camp," is a flight of fancy in the Webb style, about a summer camp where, instead of archery, canoeing, fishing and camping, the children explore the brain — the gray matter, the medulla, the cerebellum — until finally they bend to see "the mountains of awareness rise: the mind's range/moving off in silver mist..."

Like so many of Webb's poems, "Brain Camp" takes flight from a seemingly random epigraph, something the poet has come upon and pondered. In this case, it's "Students will dissect a human brain." But instead of a course description from medical school or the Biology department catalog, Webb imagines a summer camp.

Similarly, the poem, "Why Are People So Mean?" is a quotation from his six-year-old son. Webb writes:

     Bad DNA? Dyslexic genes?
     Forceps–dents in the brain? Earthquake
     in the Library of Chromosomes,
     the books reshelved by chimpanzees?

     The perky teen grabs Erik's lunch, and pokes
     his chest. "Do somethin' about it, kid..."
     The tourists give up watches, wallets, rings
     as asked; the pirates shoot them anyway.

     Birth–cord garroting? Toxic waste
     in the Neurotransmitter Sea?
     Collapsed synaptic bridges?
     Global warming of the hemispheres?

     First day of seventh grade, Lonnie Golden —
     ping–pong–paddle ears, breath like a cat box —
     whangs a locker door against my head.
     "Go lick your mamma's sugar tit," he jeers.

The poem goes on like this for four more stanzas as Webb swings around the jungle–gym in the brain camp.

"Webb Could Say Less, May Be?" is taken from a student evaluation, those end–of–term opportunities for the students to weigh in. Webb weighs in:

     Duct-tape your lips, Webb (possibly)! Botox

     your tongue to make it lie like a dead skink,
     a diving board so bounce-free, not one word
     springs into people's ears. Be — may be? —
     the hairdresser who grinds his shears to dust,

     the batting champ who swings a daffodil,
     the surgeon who trades his scalpel
     for a butter stick. Emulate a stripper who won't...

"Chelonian Rhapsody" is a hilarious poem from an intelligent turtle's point of view, based on a scientific speculation taken from Discover Magazine that introduces the poem. "Plumbed Wine" is an insightful reflection on Beethoven from a Thomas M. Cole speculation that goes: "If Keats hadn't caught TB, if Cervantes hadn't lost his hand in battle..." (p. 60) The sort of "what-if" that makes Webb's imagination run wild — and it does here, with regard to the tragic deafness that enfeebled the musical genius.

As is evident already, Webb loves wordplay, and many of his poems are extended riffs on particular words, their sound and meaning. For instance: "Hospital" ("Hot spittle sizzling on pain's grill./Hopcycle: a gamboling bike. Hopsicle:/bouncy, tooth-chilling, bad for you.//Opposite of hope's fiddle...." ); "Watermelon" ("It's a green pearl the warm earth grows/around a perfect sugar grain. It's the striped egg//of the Delectosaurus, that escaped extinction/by hiding in trees till it was safe..." ); "Thirst" ("Thirst does her striptease when you are chained to the bed, whimpering, 'Please...'.//Hunger is a marathon, thirst is a sprint. On your mark, get set, die." ).

Other targets of Webb's wit include television, always a potent source for ridicule. "He Bangs" takes aim at a contestant on American Idol (and also has an epigraph from the U.S. Marines). "Thank You, Carol White" parodies those ridiculous late-night commercials offering special discounts on cosmetic gizmos and gadgets. "Introspection After Fear Factor" profiles the familiar contestants on extreme reality shows and eases into a reflection on fear and how the "sensitive guy" (i.e., the rest of us) copes with the emotion.

There are also tender poems about his son whose sharp wit doesn't ridicule so much as empathize with the absurdities inherent in the innocence of childhood. We've already noted "Why Are People So Mean?" Others include "Invisible Alpaca," "Dairy Farm" (that place parents tell ther children dead pets have gone to), "My Son Dreams That a Shark Ate Me" (what kid hasn't been haunted by an image of his parent's death or abandonment?).

If you aren't already acquainted with Charles Harper Webb's poetry — fat chance; he seems to show up in practically every poetry journal out there, from Asheville Poetry Review to Zocalo Public Square — you get the idea that he's full of an exuberant whimsy, his brain on steroids, often wise, and nothing if not entertaining. Brain Camp certainly offers a welcome vacation for anybody looking to be intellectually amused by a guy with a gift for making fun of things.