Mixed Frequencies

January 24, 2023

Mixed Frequencies: New & Selected Poems by Peter Michelson (reviewed by Mark Spitzer)

Peter Michelson’s Posthumous Legacy Nails the Line & Much More.

The collection Mixed Frequencies is a selected overview of a poet whose work can be counted among “three significant efforts to deal with the American West in contemporary poetry: Thomas McGrath’s Letter to an Imaginary Friend, Ed Dorn’s Gunslinger, and Peter Michelson’s Pacific Plainsong” (Anania, vii). Michelson, however, will most likely be remembered as one hell of a teacher, colleague, and character with a big, hardy personality and a robust, ursine physicality. His sense of humor will also be memorialized, and his sense of poetic play (which is when he is at his best) is evident in this diverse collection of mixed frequencies containing styles ranging from prose pantoums (an innovation distinctly Michelsonian) to a mashup take on investigative verse (complete with his own postmodern method of installing parenthetical asides that work for both meter and multiple levels of narration) to voices based in unique erotic and enviro tones with inspirations stemming from Stein (having too much fun with repetition) to Pound (omniscient visionary qualities) to Olson (except Michelson pleasingly closes his parentheticals rather than leaving them dangling open in the air) to forms of Barrymore (ie, “Dakotah Dreamsong”).

Two poems, in particular, combine Michelson’s sense of play and sense of humor, thereby creating a notable alchemy:

The first is “Advertisement,” which kicks off with a tongue-in-cheek reality challenge that “You’re / standing by the pomeshelf / in one—no more than two—of the twenty bookstores that / sell poems across this great / land,” setting the tenor of what to expect. A boldly ludicrous mock-patriotism is then employed for persona purposes as he returns to the second person, placing you (Reader) in mode of deciding who you’re gonna buy: Gary Snyder, Ferlinghetti? Nope! “They are freaks!” who do not love their country,which is why you, Reader, should buy this book and support a “small and dwindling group who / loves our mothers” and “despise drugs.” (93) To pump up the ridiculousness, Michelson then plays an over-the-top, made-in-America card, stating this book was published “for your protection” by “American printers, who will not / print lies, slander or filth” (94) before ending with a quicky statement on Capitalism and some more overblown patriotism.

The second poem that highlights Michelson’s mixing of wordplay and comedy is “The Chair,” which goofs avec pretentious language to comment upon the duties of a genderless administrator. Michelson has a blast playing with this metaphor, which “switches from the catbird to the hot seat” with a disposition that “smacks of Nazis.”* The linguistic carnival continues on, singsonging in a symphonic way, until, finally, the connection is made between the “grand and gorgeously / embellished” position occupied by a “sui generis” generic chair (department head) charged with ruling “unruly factions” in “churlish times” and one charged with electricity: “Nonetheless, we’re proud / we’re free to sit selective culprits in the chair” (10).

What sticks out, though, in this poem and the brunt of the earlier verse compiled herein, is an overkill skill at end-rhyming during a century-plus decrying said crime. One gets the impression that Michelson embraces ye olde scheme as a classical act of protest, which is the direction his poetry eventually takes. That is, in this chronology, you can see the evolution of his corpus go from lyrical laughter of self-amusement to a much more serious free verse that gets real, reflecting on the politics of revolution and the massacrist erasure of Native American cultures, which forged and informed his final voice. In “Preface to The Works of H. H. Bancraft,” “Plainsong at Lapush,” and “Bestride the Mighty and Heretofore Deemed Endless Missouri,” we witness the chrysalises of Michelson’s most empathetic and scholarly voice from the pre-Woke POV of the historically dispossessed (poetics infused with a dire drumbeat instilling the cardinal sin this country is still dealing with, which makes his words burn into consciousness) because this is serious business, People!

Meanwhile, along the way, there are extreme moments of poetic profundity. Ie:

And questions of art are, we say

these days all too unwittingly, questions

of execution. So, we find, are those

of life. Questions of art, then, are questions

of life—matters, that is, of execution (217)

and

Though children call us father we are children

until the ones that we call father die (183)

and

Shit, a place that breeds indigenous queers can’t be all bad (118)

All this to say that there is more than just something worth studying in Mixed Frequencies that can be useful for contemporary poets—because this is the work of a poet’s poet. I would not recommend it for readers in general (they will be amused, but they will not always see the tricks), but I would recommend it for any twenty-first-century versifier who gives a damn about nailing the line with exquisite exactitude to arrive at a series of messages that resonate with elegance in an ever-expanding void of decency and verve.

___________________________________________________________________________

* Btw, rhyming “hot seat” with “Nazis” is not an easy thing to do, but Michelson pulls it off with a craftsman’s flair. His eye for rhyming also goes way beyond the pat practitioner’s knack for hack when he fuses dialectically opposed elements for contrasting tensions such as “Indicate the absence of a ‘Noble Heart’? / Oh circumstance sharper than a pastor’s fart!” (151).

Mixed Frequencies: New & Selected Poems

Peter Michelson, MadHat Press

paperback, 275 pages

Mark Spitzer is the author of 30-plus books, some about "monster fish," another about writing pedagogy, plus novels, memoirs, poetry collections and literary translations. As Editor in Chief of the poetry series Toad Suck Editions (an evolution of the legendary Toad Suck Review), he has been a creative writing professor at the University of Central Arkansas and Truman State University, but now spends the brunt of his time in New York's Hudson Valley walking his dog, hunting wild fungi, and renovating a 322-year-old farm house. More info at sptzr.net.

Drunk on All Your Strange New Words

January 12, 2023

Drunk on All Your Strange New Words by Eddie Robson (reviewed by Mica Corson)

What is the job of the translator once technology advances? What circumstances eliminate the need for translations? These questions inspired TV comedy and science fiction writer, Eddie Robson, to write his third full-length novel, Drunk on All Your Strange New Words.

Robson was originally a television writer, and it shows in this novel. This unconventional, surprisingly lively exploration of a near-future culture is not bogged down with heavy prose or overly intricate concepts. The setup is focused, and the characters’ journeys move quickly, leaving the reader little time to overanalyze the writing choices. That isn’t to say Robson’s writing isn’t clever or well thought out. Robson enhances this literary piece with narrative principles more common in screenwriting, such as Chekhov’s Gun, a principle that asserts that every element highlighted in a story must be necessary. For example, if the writer takes the time to describe a gun hanging on the wall with expert detail, that same gun needs to go off before the end of the story. This minimalism is the hallmark of Robson’s style. Every element he incudes enhances the plot. His writing is streamlined, and his characterizations developed through action over anything else. Every action leads to a new plot point that propels the story without dallying in unnecessary tangents.

The brisk-paced story begins with Lydia, a woman in her early thirties who works as a translator for a diplomatic cultural attaché. An alien one. In this novel, reminiscent of classic science fiction, Earth has been approached by an alien species, the Logi, who are interested in sharing and understanding cultural knowledge. However, Lydia finds it difficult to translate for cultural attaché Fitzwilliam (or Fitz as Lydia takes to calling him), since he, like all Logi, can only speak telepathically. In translating this telepathic speech, human translators find themselves wobbly and disoriented, as translating the Logi’s language makes the human speaker essentially drunk: “As Lydia translates Fitz’s conversations with these people, the language takes its toll on her sobriety, and she feels increasingly loose-tongued.” (Robson, 14) The human body wasn’t meant to communicate this way, and the act of translation leaves the translator with altered faculties that often lead to embarrassing consequences for Lydia.

After some standard worldbuilding and character setup, the plot kicks in, blending science fiction with a murder mystery. Lydia is at a loss after a tragic event shakes her life and job. Her boss is dead, she’s the prime suspect, and she has no memory of their last moments together due to her massive hangover from working as a translator that very night. With the risk of an intergalactic incident, she has to hunt for answers, wading through the sea of digital information. In this near-future world, the digital sphere is an all-encompassing pool of flashy headlines, clickbait, fake news, and conspiracy theories. Her search is guided by the remnants of Fitz, whose voice resonates in her head. While Lydia fears that Fitz’s voice will drive her to the brink of insanity, she can’t help but hold on to the last echo of the mind she was closest with, “That’ll be a shame, when his voice has gone. Maybe after a while she’ll forget what it even sounded like. There are no recordings of it, after all.” (Robson, 60)

While initially inspired by questions of translators and language barriers, the novel focuses more extensively on the potential future role of social media, especially the rise of conspiracy theories, truth, and lies in media. A commentary on modern culture, Drunk on All Your Strange New Words is primarily a science fiction novel. As such, it establishes a culture and technology that is foreign to the reader. While the novel’s technology is based on more modern counterparts, Robson changes and adds enough details and functions that the novel’s beginning can be a bit jarring. However, with Robson’s consistency and underflowing humor, it is easy to adapt to the futuristic world he establishes. Since Lydia’s translation is based on telepathy, the novel focuses less on linguistics and language barriers and more on modern human culture. How would our culture represent itself, what parts are shared willingly, and what is omitted? “Because if you can control the stories a culture tells about itself, you can control who they are.” (Robson, 129)

Drunk on All Your Strange New Words by Eddie Robson is a science fiction adventure that melds genres and, like many classic works of science fiction, makes a clear commentary on modern cultural concerns. With a light tone, Robson’s wit and theatrical plot carry the novel’s themes of culture and digital conspiracy to a wild conclusion, leaving the audience with stimulating questions on the nature of truth in the digital age.

Drunk on All Your Strange New Words by Eddie Robson, published in 2020 by Tom Doherty Associates.

Mica Corson is an avid reader and aspiring writer residing in the Pacific Northwest. She recently graduated from Central Washington University with a Professional and Creative Writing degree.

The Book of Smaller

January 7, 2023

the book of smaller, by Rob Mclennan (reviewed by Mark Spitzer)

From the start, we know this collection of postmodern prose poetry (none exceeding a dozen lines) is quirky. Like all the poems in the book of smaller, the first one, “Beware the failure of imagination,” deliberately confounds its audience by kicking off with “Civilization is neither prose.” This prompts a WTF moment in most readers, stopping us in our paths. We then mull this over, move on to questions lacking question marks, and after a few intentional ambiguities, we get to something specific on ants. The moral of the story: “We are never at rest.”

This, of course, is a sentiment we can all agree on, along with the fact that these poems have a way of ending satisfactorily. You get a bunch of mysteries (i.e., “Stardust, atoms, Barcalounger”), and the last lines put things into perspective (i.e., “What needs not be written”).

Collectively, we can’t help trying to make sense of what this verse is striving to do. Hence, we see this work as the poet journaling his day-to-day activities while plugging in sporadic thoughtservations (meaning a cross between “thoughts” and “observations”). Mclennan does this whimsically, while employing “gaps” (or “erasures”) in the popular style of the lyric essay.

For example, in the poem “Postcard for Gil McElroy,” there’s something purposefully missing between the penultimate lines of “If this should be hand-delivered. By you, to you. Posted” and the quintessential line “But the stars.” Such juxtapositions take us out of the familiar, the local, the micro (or “smaller”), and out and into the Macroverse, where human insignificance becomes even more apparent. Thus, by boiling various scenarios down to their essentials and by leaving standard transitions out along with piddly points that tend to meddle, the poetry becomes omnipotently Olympian in a quasi-Whitmanesque way, thereby arriving at “A wicked truth that does no harm” (another last line), which can assist us (or at least the poet) “To know more than nothing” (also a last line).

The result is that the book of smaller operates like a concept album in which readers “Smell the ink through the page.” That is, we’re asked to employ our sensory abilities to decode metaphors and cryptic language, because girlfriend, this Canadian ain’t giving it away for free.

Perhaps this is Mclennan’s objective, to toss out clues, then guide us to a definitive message. But maybe that’s me trying to find an equation to explain the logic of how these poems function—when actually, whatever’s driving this solid, experimental bus is something simply natural.

As Mclennan notes in one of his multiple poems entitled “journal entry,” “My thinking is all out of order.” But that’s not unusual; his thinking is basically a reflection of our own since we all meditate in bursts and bytes, moving forward and then back in time. That’s how we create order from disorder. The only difference is Mclennan does it on the page as practice, whereas most of us say whatever pops into our heads. Or we don’t.

The poem “Failed senryū” provides an appropriate segue for getting at what I’m talking about when it asks, “Is this, or is this not, about the appropriation of forms.” To which I reply: Nope, this is not entirely about appropriating forms. What it’s about is mutating forms while deviating from and innovating on appropriations in order to get to instances like “The sidewalk has no taste for anecdote,” “Privilege: the luxury to ignore,” and other zinger dismemberments.

Meanwhile, Mclennan reflects on his process: “Every work a hymn. A set of amputated limbs.” This is the method he employs for designing a selection of sacredly profane yet truncated thoughtservations in which readers decipher “A series of commentaries on muteness.” Because we’re small.

This answers my main question of why Mclennan did what he did in the way he did, but I’m a bit miffed at the publisher for not providing any framework for understanding the poet’s aesthetic. This could’ve been accomplished through a preface or a note or a blurb or whatever, but Calgary UP just went ahead and published the book without trying to place the poetics into context; they just shoveled it onto our plates and said, “Hey you, figure this out.”

This not-so-user-friendly approach is also reflected on the book’s epigraph page, where minor errors in the capitalization and lowercasing of book titles are easily missed. Typically, things like these are added last minute, and it’s not uncommon for such snafus to escape the eyes of editors. Still, it’s always a bummer when this happens because it comes off as disinterest. However, as Mclennan discerningly states in the only one-line poem in the collection (entitled “Policy”) this is “The cost of our language.”

University of Calgary Press, paperback, 114 pages, 2022

Mark Spitzer is the author of 30-plus books, some about "monster fish," another about writing pedagogy, plus novels, memoirs, poetry collections and literary translations. As Editor in Chief of the poetry series Toad Suck Editions (an evolution of the legendary Toad Suck Review), he has been a creative writing professor at the University of Central Arkansas and Truman State University, but now spends the brunt of his time in New York's Hudson Valley walking his dog, hunting wild fungi, and renovating a 322-year-old farm house. More info at sptzr.net.

New York, My Village

December 23, 2022

New York, My Village, by Uwem Akpan (reviewed by Katy Mitchell-Jones)

Ekong Otis Udousoro is in Nigeria preparing for his visa interview to America for a fellowship trip. This trip to New York City will focus on learning the ins and outs of the industry at a small publishing house while editing an anthology on the Biafran War. Along the way, he will meet hardships out of his control.

Though only spanning the first couple chapters, the visa interview process and repeated visits to the immigration office mean long lines and high anxiety for Ekong. He has meticulously prepared all the necessary documents, including backups—just in case. The interview begins with odd questions about whether he plans to commit a crime, “Unlike your compatriots, you’re not going to America to fill up the prisons are you?” He is asked which tribe he is from and whether he can prove it actually exists. The interviewer ends up denying his request on the grounds that he was unable to prove he would not return to Nigeria; although, she never directly asked him questions regarding this. He is informed to reapply. The whole interaction lasted only four minutes, and leaves the reader feeling angry and confused on his behalf.

Ekong arrives in August of 2016, but feels no “relief” after the very rocky road in getting there. He gets to his Times Square apartment, which is described as a bit worse for wear with gaps in the windows, beat up dining chairs, and a small kitchen. He checks in with Molly, his NYC publisher supervisor, over the phone and then the man from whom he will sublease. Both Americans attempt to show how angry they are with the immigration officers, but it is he who ends up consoling them. While he seems to have some supportive white people around him, Ekong is placed in positions where he often comforts and reassures others.

He is weary of working alongside so many white people though his reception was welcoming. He talks more with his new colleagues and notices they, “had carefully digested what they read about Nigeria,” and expressed that they wanted to try Nigerian food, which pleases him. He, “knew they were genuinely interested in [his] background... [his] face looked happy and fresh and relaxed.” He also gets to know Molly a bit more. She has worked for many publishers and gives him the advice that relationships are everything. Though this seems like sound advice, it is apparent that there are more barriers for some people to initiate and build these relationships, as both parties must be receptive.

There are several observations he makes about his life in Nigeria versus New York. While grocery shopping, he comments the yams are much smaller than in Nigeria, and the next day when he gets dressed for mass, his traditional Nigerian clothing induces him to trip while going down the stairs. He must don western clothes to accommodate his surroundings, dampening his mood. While at St Patrick's Cathedral, he reflects it is too grand for him, too imposing, and too traditional. The people there seem to be, “moping at the altar,” and he does not want to return.

There are strong themes of both blatant and subtle racism, inequity, and bias. Many of the interactions Ekong has with people leaves him confused and angry. There are two men, one white and one of Asian descent, living in his building. Despite his greeting, they ignore him. He comments that the city is diverse: “New Yorkers and their tourists came in all manner of colors and races and sizes and clothing and languages. It was intense.” But, the diversity does not seem to be celebrated. He thinks back to his two neighbors and worries that he perhaps greeted them incorrectly, again, giving the other party the benefit of the doubt. After entering his building, he meets another African man who greets him, making him feel better. This man, Keith, tells Ekong that those two men were talking about him earlier and they seemed angry about his presence. Ekong is warned to keep his head down, but ultimately he resolves to confront them.

Ekong collides with the systems and procedures in place at the publishing company. At his first staff meeting, everyone seems consumed with a book that he believes has huge flaws. However, everyone else insists that an acquisition bid is important. He realizes this is probably the first time they have ever held book deliberations with a black person in the room—he feels cautious and uncomfortable. As for the book he supports, the marketing team does not support a bid. Instead, they encourage Emily, a white staffer, to write a memoir about her experience on the topic at hand, which again makes the reader feel indignant on Ekong’s behalf. He offers to edit Emily’s memoir if it comes to fruition, but the marketing team shoots him down again, saying it would be difficult for him, since he is not familiar with the American southern culture. He points out that they have been editing African writing, which causes an awkward silence.

Beyond theme, symbolism is a large literary component in this novel. The author describes the physical spaces—his apartment, his office, and the buildings as a whole—which mirror Ekong’s feelings. Specifically, after his first day, he looks back up at the skyscraper and compares it to, “a stranger smiling at me behind dark glasses.” The intimidation created by the building’s appearance is only amplified with the intimidation he feels within its walls. There are also issues with insects in his apartment that keep him itchy and irritated throughout his stay. Eventually, he becomes irritated to the point of paranoia, staying up through the night in an attempt to find relief.

The novel has its lighthearted moments, and Ekong does sometimes manage to have positive experiences. He visits the Bronx to see a childhood friend and immediately loves it for its diversity and atmosphere. When he arrives at his friend's home, he is in awe of how beautiful their unit is. His friend’s daughter forms an attachment to him, calling him her uncle, and asks him about Nigeria. Despite the marketing team, his overall experience with most of his coworkers was also positive; he appreciates Molly when she asks about his background and Emily makes an effort to hang out with him outside of work.

Ultimately, this story is about a man’s journey into a harsh and unfamiliar country, where he learns the jarring truths about prevailing racism in a seemingly progressive city. It is a powerful tool for anyone to reflect upon their own experiences and interactions with people from different places.

New York, My Village by Uwem Akpan, published in 2021 by W.W. Norton & Company. 416 pages

Katy Mitchell-Jones is originally from a small town in Washington state and graduated from the University of Washington in Seattle with her BA and MA. She then headed to Boston to teach high school English but has since returned to her west coast roots. Her favorite authors are Margaret Atwood, David Sedaris, Tana French, and Glendy Vanderah. She has published three short stories with Chipper Press, for middle-grades. You can follow her on Goodreads here.

Joan

December 9, 2022

Joan by Katherine J. Chen (reviewed my Mica Corson)

The name Joan of Arc is widely known, yet most could not tell you the years she lived, the battles she fought, or almost anything about the historical context of her existence. She is admired and referenced but only through a foggy lens. In Katherine J. Chen’s novel Joan, this shining figure emerges from our vague collective memory as a flesh and blood woman.

Chen fully admits that her fictionalized version of Joan is incredibly personal. She is a vibrant character with a complicated relationship with God, while a soldier first and foremost. Many retellings of Joan of Arc depict her with visions and hallucinations of the archangel Michael. In them, she becomes another example of extreme Christian devotion, often compared to the girls who starved themselves, citing the Holy Spirit as their only sustenance, or like the monk who walked on their hands to praise Mary. However, Chen writes Joan with a distinctly modern view. This Joan is practical. Her motivations go beyond her faith. She is not just a servant of God waving a banner for France but an imposing figure of a woman - tall, strong, and empathetic to the people’s struggles.

Essayist Hilary Mantel writes that Chen made Joan of Arc a “woman for our time.” (Mantel, Cover Copy) While Joan is a work of fiction, Chen researched dozens of biographies of Joan in order to write from what inspired her, thereby creating a relatable and likable character. It explores a young woman’s fascination with war, with heart-pounding battles, shining weapons, and the overwhelming desire to survive.

Written in four parts with brief historical interludes of the events that encompass the novel, this realistic retelling begins in the small French village of Domrémy. In 1422 Joan was a ten-year-old girl known by the villagers as the one who would always lend a helping hand and would never be found in her father’s house. Jacques d’Arc, Joan’s father, is a great speaker and a great swindler who is constantly at odds with his youngest daughter. His abuse toward her was emotional and physical. This tense relationship spurs Joan’s first sincere motivation, which was the goal of leaving her stifling village and of making her own way in life.

Joan’s story begins in earnest during an incident between adolescent boys that results in a young boy’s death. This image of death, of innocence being brutally lost, resonates in her mind throughout her entire life. That childhood trauma solidified not a fear of death, but an all-encompassing resolve to survive, “She makes a promise, whispers it into the dark, imprinting it in the night sky as the boy’s face is imprinted in her memory. The promise is this: If she, Joan, has a choice, then she will choose to be a thrower of rocks. She will live.” (Chen, 25)

After the people of her village are dragged into the war between France and Britain, Joan makes her way to the city of Vaucouleurs with a specific goal. In her mind, she determined that all the pain and suffering that her loved ones have faced is caused by those keeping the countries in perpetual states of war. There were the Kings and Dukes of England and the Dauphin, who was the future king of France. Joan, at sixteen years old, is an impressive figure standing over most men. After several feats of strength, the local powers allow her to train to fight, then arrange for her to be shown to the Dauphin as a potential aid in the current war.

In the Dauphin’s court, Joan’s skills as a warrior and military leader improve rapidly. Rumors about her being a gift from God begin to swirl. They say that she was sent to help the French remove the invading English from their cities. Joan herself is skeptical of God’s role. She is a woman of some faith, but over the course of her life she questions God’s intervention. Her allies full-heartedly support the claims, and they go so far as to cite biblical prophecies, including references from legends of Merlin about a young virgin girl who will free them from war. In fact, her allies use these claims to their advantage, “A poor, unlearned woman who has run away from home with no family to protect her. What is she? Nothing? But everyone will listen to an interment of God.” (Chen, 179) Her gains in battle solidified those claims in the eyes of nobility and common people. However, Joan does not let these ideas of her define or distract her. She fights because she is good at it and sees the good in what she does. For the first time, she truly finds herself when she is a soldier, “My sword was no longer just a sword. I did not sense either the weight or the heft of it, for it was as though I were holding my own soul.” (Chen, 206)

Chen’s writing is beautiful, descriptive, and moving. Although the story describes battles, the narrative is not packed with action; rather, it is often meditative. It encapsulates the events’ intensity and richly imagines the characters. There are times when it becomes frustratingly clear how deeply rooted the misogyny of the era is, but Chen balances these moments with Joan’s practical and modern personality, establishing her odds with the sexist cultures and her perceptions on gender, “For a man cannot see anything in the world without wishing to wear it like a trophy on his back, to call himself master over it. To her, this is what it means to be a man.” (Chen, 221)

Most know the end of Joan’s story from history or perhaps the vague mention in popular culture, and there is no twist at the end of this one. But Chen embeds this character with so much life and perseverance that we can look at her short life with admiration. She is a figure remembered longer than any of the nobility that supported or abandoned her, and she was even sainted nearly five hundred years after her death. Katherine Chen’s Joan is an excellent example of history reimagined, showing us a very human portrayal of Joan of Arc with determination and an uncompromising sense of self.

Joan by Katherine J. Chen, published in 2022 by Random House. 350 pages.

Mica Corson is an avid reader and aspiring writer residing in the Pacific Northwest. She recently graduated from Central Washington University with a Professional and Creative Writing degree.

Husbandry

November 17, 2022

Husbandry by Matthew Dickman (reviewed by Alex Russell)

Matthew Dickman’s newest book of poems, Husbandry, focuses on parenthood. His poetry does not mince words – thematically, his intentions are clear; syntactically, there are no clumsy echoes. Everything is right there, visible and clear.

As a single parent with two young sons, the author’s world – as revealed in his poems – often revolves around everyday life. We see him folding clothes, cleaning dishes, and cooking food. In sparse yet precise language, he presents everything – from the monumental to the mundane -- with due diligence and a measure of concerned distance.

Most of the poems in Husbandry follow an established structure. Each stanza is made up of two short lines, making up a careful-sounding dialogue. After a while, the deliberate weight of each word becomes a signpost along a varied, expansive, living path.

Many pieces include conversations he has had with his sons. “Crossing Guard” is one such series of moments between a father and son as the two talk about lost friends. Without romanticizing it, being overly sentimental or trivializing it, death is a subject that is evenly threaded throughout each stanza. As the two talk about absent friends, the pair finds a dead animal in the road.

“For a moment I think / we will be standing / here forever, he and I / watching death / do its slow work / like someone restoring / a painting / but in reverse.”

It is this kind of soft dissection of death – this large and all-encompassing thing – where Dickman finds his power. Part of this skill rests in the author taking his time with the experiences and ideas he wants to discuss; in a thought-out and patient manner, he lays everything out for the reader.

Plain language does not equate to simplistic thinking and Dickman’s poetry is a testament to this. In a piece titled “Father,” he delves into the significance of names:

“Fathers with names / like Joseph, / Yosef, Josiah, Yasef, / meaning he will add…Fathers with names / like Ernie, Ernest, Ernesto, / Arnošt, meaning kindness.” With an almost stoic grace, Dickman ponders little asides like this – taking in minute complexities and the interconnectedness of language, human culture and thought – without ever making it feel like stalling for time or senseless, aesthetic meandering.

“Father” ends with a bittersweet but crucial realization on the author’s part: “I know / there are / really three children / in the story of my life. / I must make a home / for each of them.”

It’s true that many sons become fathers, but Dickman goes several steps further to illustrate a kind of fluid, revolving continuum. Three short stanzas reveal something tender and real at his core both as a writer and human being.

The poem ends without any huge reveal or twist; there is nothing prefabricated or resupplied for cheap emotional string-pulling. “I must make a home / for each of them” is an instance of pure personal reflection. Here, Dickman balances out both the internal and external aspects of his life and, in a broader sense, human nature.

Taking into account his naked fears, anxieties, and his myriad responsibilities as a father, many poems in the book – without spelling it out – attempt to arrive at some pertinent balance.

To find consistent harmony, in writing as in life, everything must be appraised. Thankfully, in Dickman’s writing, nothing is too big or too small to feature in his gorgeous, elegiac writing.

In “Lilac,” he savors “that amazing lemon / frosted lemon cake” from Starbucks, while he holds his youngest son and listens to “his body living, / alive outside / his mother’s body, and the lilac / outside on the street, outside / everyone, and heavy in the rain.”

As these stanzas make their way down the page, their tone is one of patience and resilience, and free of any ego. They move from a casual scene inside a Starbucks to the weight of the external world, always in flux.

Even though certain poems may seem to go off on tangents, Husbandry is to poetry what Dark Side of the Moon is to rock and roll; every aspect fits into a natural progression of thought and feeling. Interspersed throughout the book are prose pieces, two-lines at most, highlighting his sons Hamza and Owen and their individual reactions to their parents’ separation as well as their own burgeoning journeys in life.

Dickman’s writing is supremely candid about all things – separation from his wife is no exception to this. At times unabashedly pointed, at others frank and forgiving, the separation, in literary or thematic terms, could be considered a major inciting event in Husbandry.

More so than in actual, physical terms, what the separation took to mean for Dickman is a constant work-in-progress; a reappraisal of himself, Matthew Dickman – adult, writer, father, son, friend, lover.

In “Parenting and Virginia Woolf,” beautifully and bluntly, Dickman writes: “For weeks after / the separation really / kind people kept / telling me that I was / on a journey, this is / your journey / they would say / and I would want to / scoop out their / eyeballs with one / of my grandmother’s / silver grapefruit / spoons.” Spiteful? Maybe. But entirely human and universal.

Like the book as a whole, “Parenting and Virginia Woolf” takes time to develop, examine, exist in, and finally outgrow, the author’s individual, private hurt. “I am not on a journey, / I am cooking / dinner for my kids. / I am washing their / hair and underwear, / I am trying to go / for walks outside, / trying to eat more vegetables.” Not a journey, but a process.

A lot of the time, while reading Husbandry, it was hard to keep going. Dickman’s writing is “raw” – not in the sense of something unfinished, because his poems are as complete as diamonds, but in the way that exposed flesh will be red and sensitive to everything, even light.

In the end, it’s this sensitivity that, no matter how close he cuts to home, makes one return to his writing. There is something fulfilling and wonderful in being able to meet pain and vulnerability on level footing. Poetry, it seems, is Matthew Dickman’s way of doing just that.

Near the end of Husbandry, Dickman reflects in “Anniversary” how “The night isn’t as long / a year later, or bullied or rootless or night at all.” As painful as it often is, growth is still growth – eventually making us a little wiser, if not stronger.

Husbandry by Matthew Dickman, published in 2022 by W. W. Norton & Company. 142 pages.

Alex Russell earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from George Mason University and now works in the field of journalism and publishing. He has contributed poetry to a variety of literary magazines and art journals, such as The Elevation Review, 300 Days of Sun, and The Ignatian Literary Magazine. His contributions to the Falls Church News-Press, a locally owned newspaper in the Washington, DC area, can be found online at fcnp.com.

The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections

November 10, 2022

The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections by Eva Jurczyk (review by Katy Mitchell-Jones)

At an unnamed Toronto university, Liesl, the middle-aged protagonist, tries to fill the shoes of her boss who is on medical leave. After the disorganized but well-loved library director Christopher suffers a stroke and lies unconscious in a hospital, Liesl steps in, much to the disappointment of her colleagues. Despite her hard work over the years, Liesl has taken a quiet back seat approach to her work, while Christopher reaped the rewards. The story begins with Liesl attempting to open a safe in Christopher’s office, while the university president nervously stands by, hoping to confirm that the newest acquisition to the library’s collection is indeed safe.

Upon finally opening the vault, she sees it is empty, and the acquisition is missing. Was it stolen? Or simply misshelved? No matter what happened to it, everyone gives her a hard time, and everyone, including the university president, urges her not to go to the police. The police would, she is told, bring bad press and they would lose donor money if they are perceived as irresponsible. This novel subtly illustrates the bureaucracy of big institutions, and how little people in leadership positions actually have very little power. Like many of us, Liesl finds herself in a situation with responsibilities that she simply does not know how to begin or even process, which causes her to think twice about who she trusts.

To add to Liesl’s stress, one of her colleagues goes missing shortly thereafter. Did this colleague have anything to do with the disappearance of the very expensive acquisition? Or is someone just trying to make it appear this way? Liesl doubts there was any foul-play, and suspects her colleague simply requested time off prior to her tenancy as interim director, and that Christopher did not note it down. However, as readers, we know that something is out of place, and we must wait until Liesl and her colleagues uncover the truth.

It is impossible not to consider which employee is behind the theft and disappearance. Was it Mariam, who acts oddly and avoids spending time with Liesl? Or Francis, her best friend at work, who urges her not to involve the police? Her husband even agrees she should not call, and it should be reported to the university president first. Or was it Christopher’s wife, the one who provided the safe’s combination? Perhaps it was the ex-priest, who was banished from his church after his involvement with stealing church money? The list of suspects is not short, and no one is immune to being on it.

Though these disappearances are the main focus of the story, there is another plotline about a newly hired math professor, who wants to carbon date a famous bible the library houses. Liesl is apprehensive of this request, as she has other things on her mind and doesn't want any damage inflicted on the text. Liesl’s relationship with this professor begins on uncertain terms, as she doesn’t know who she can trust not only with expensive library artifacts, but with her own thoughts. She must constantly think about what Christopher would do in these situations and deal with the reactions of her colleagues, who seem disappointed no matter what she decides. As the story progresses, we see Liesl come into her own, as she begins to have more confidence in her decision making ability.

Her relationships outside of work are also portrayed as somewhat rocky; her husband suffers from depression and though he has been in good moods lately, Liesl knows this can change any day. A prior affair with a colleague is also alluded to more than once, and as readers, we are uncertain about the specifics of what her husband knows. Additionally, though she has a good relationship with her daughter Hannah, Hannah spends less and less time around the house and seems to take her father’s side on anything that comes up.

Some of the best moments in this read come from the dry humor that Jurczyk uses in Liesl’s thoughts and observations. Liesl comments she would enjoy the campus more if there were not so many undergraduates around, and that she worries when a young English professor waves a croissant too close to a Shakespeare first folio. Additionally, the university president, who carries his bike helmet in the opening chapter, is in the process of training for a marathon and consistently complains about sore muscles while snacking on trail mix. This inner commentary offers some comedic relief, but is also very relatable for the reader, as they come naturally and are quick quips.

Overall this novel portrayed a believable and authentic voice of a protagonist who is close to retirement age. This book will be a five-star read to those of us who enjoy libraries, academia, and slow-medium paced reads with dry humor. While this book is not necessarily a suspense-filled thriller, you will become determined to figure out what happened to the missing text and in the lives of the characters.

published in 2022 by Poisoned Pen Press. 352 pages.

Sisters

October 27, 2022

Sisters by Daisy Johnson (review by Mica Corson)

September and July are ten months apart but share the same birthday. They are inseparable siblings dealing with the severity of adolescence and are bound together by promises that one will never let the other forget. In Sisters, author Daisy Johnson explores the dynamic web tying two girls together and the bonds of envy and impulse that develop over their young lives.

This tense and unsettling novel begins with sisters September and July returning in their teens to the house where they were born - the Settle House. Johnson’s prose has strong poetic elements, relying heavily on rhythm and repetition. It is overflowing with visceral images that mark the dread and unease surrounding their new home. Much like the image of a fractured face that makes up the cover of this contemporary fiction novel, the prose is a mix of short and fractured sentences that create an almost fervent pace, heightening the tension of the ominous unknown event that led the sisters and their mother to the Settle House.

July, the younger sister, acts as our narrator, providing the audience with vulnerable and candid confessions in a first-person perspective as she explores the Settle House, a decaying seaside cottage in Yorkshire. Through the novel’s three parts, we are also given third-person perspectives from September and the girls’ mother, Sheela.

September is the leader, the caretaker, and the manipulator. Her mother finds her stubborn and obstinate and far too capable of cruelty. However, to her younger sister, she is an idol. September is a confident and all-encompassing presence. “Yes. I think then, as I have so many times, she is the person I have always wanted to be. I am a shape cut out of the universe, tinged with ever-dying stars-and she is the creature to fill the gap I leave in the world.” (Johnson, 91) July views herself as an extension of September, following her words only. Where September goes, so does she, following in her shadow. July is the peacemaker, the introvert, and the only one to soften September’s harsh edge, creating a pair so connected they would not even let their mother have an intimate role in their lives.

Their mother, Sheela, had long struggled before returning to the house. As a writer, mother, and woman, she has dealt with depression, borderline abusive relationships, and a growing fear for her isolated daughters. “They always seemed to be telling some great secret, some truth only they could know. The look in their eyes when she came across them, the sudden silence that she could not quite break into.” (Johnson, 106) Moving to the Settle house after an ominously vague “what had happened,” Sheela’s mental health is low, leaving July to rely even more on September.

From its first page to the last, this novel contains no dialogue. The format of dialogue remains, propelling short conversations primarily between the sisters. Nevertheless, its absence is striking, keeping the narrative internal and philosophical. An eerie, unsettling nature comes to the Settle House with the sisters as their behavior becomes more erratic in their isolation. The external plot is slow-moving, intersected with details from the sisters’ early life and the incident that brought them to the Settle House. Instead, the riveting and twisting relationship between September and July creates a profoundly moving story.

Sisters by Daisy Johnson, published in 2020 by Riverhead Books. 210 pages

Mica Corson is an avid reader and aspiring writer residing in the Pacific Northwest. She recently graduated from Central Washington University with a Professional and Creative Writing degree.

Time Is A Mother

October 13, 2022

Time Is A Mother by Ocean Vuong (reviewed by Alex Russell)

It can be very difficult, when evaluating a piece of art — in this case, Ocean Vuong’s sophomore poetry collection, Time is a Mother — not to make comparisons to other, related works. It is almost a compulsion; having to connect the thing you are talking about to something else just to explain it better.

Connection, successfully or unsuccessfully, pleasantly or with disastrous aftermath, is a major theme in Vuong’s work; something that he evaluates with ease, though, never bogging the narrative imagery down. He does it earnestly and with alarming certitude. As a writer reading another writer’s stone-cold brilliance is envy-inducing and inspiring. As a reader, it takes me out of myself to reconnect me with some of my missing pieces.

Vuong’s sharp and powerful command over his chosen method of communication with the outside world is exemplified through his control of pacing and rhythm.

“The Bull,” an introductory piece, is a crystal clear, unflinching realization centering on physical as well as emotional touch. It’s also a very gorgeous, near-sublime poem about understanding yourself through the help of something (or someone) else.

Most if not all of the poems in Time is a Mother are gorgeous. Many of them seek to provide context for the painful, and sometimes unexplainable things, in life.

It may be difficult for readers unfamiliar with confessional poetry — developed and brought to cultural and academic acknowledgement by many brilliant writers such as Sylvia Plath, Robert Lowell, and Allen Ginsberg — to feel comfortable with Vuong’s words. That is okay.

The occasionally jagged edges of his stanzas (visually) and the occasionally robust, economical, or jarring word-choice (for example: “fuck he said/oh fuck you’re so much/like my little brother,” from the poem “Dear Peter”), are intentional in their bluntness without shining a big glaring spotlight on themselves. Being human can be a brutal experience; Vuong’s work, in its careful and empathetic approach to life and people, provides a series of images that ring with honesty and a simple goal of saying, here it is.

There are signs and symbols one might not expect in Time is a Mother. The image of a Colt factory, or a plate of “triple stack…jumbo pancakes at Denny’s after top surgery.”

“New England’s endless/leaves. Maybe I saw a boy/in a black apron crying in a Nissan/the size of a monster’s coffin.” These pictures feel all the more real because Vuong does not shy away from an intimate and painstakingly real point of view.

Some of these scenes almost ooze with palpable isolation, like the “backyard, so dark,” evoking, at least in my mind, the great painting Cape Cod Evening by Edward Hopper.

There are voices from other rooms and other eras peeking through as well. They appear like visitors or guides to provide commentary or elucidation. They are not necessarily foreign to Vuong; they are rhythms and sounds he might have picked up on his way.

“I know the room you’ve been crying in/is called America,” from “Beautiful Short Loser,” sounds like something from a piece of prose out of a Jack Kerouac novel. Yet it also feels indigenous to Vuong’s experience as a writer and as a person. The two are inseparable if you do it for long enough.

The prose-poem “Nothing,” near the middle of the book, is reminiscent in form and style to Dennis Cooper’s poetry. Violence and homosexuality and deep, passionate love are all characteristics of Vuong’s verse, just as they are of Cooper’s. Perhaps this is another junction where their poetry meets — however temporarily. The further one reads, the more obvious it becomes: Vuong’s voice and syntax are entirely his own.

A segment from “Nothing” reads, “But to live like a bullet, to touch people with such intention. To be born going one way, toward everything alive.” This is how Vuong’s poems found me with his first poetry book, Night Sky with Exit Wounds and this is how it finds me now, with Time is a Mother.

Of Vietnamese heritage, Vuong paints surrealistic scenes of the war in Vietnam in both collections. In this book, however, unlike in his first, surrealism becomes almost an end and not just a means. Sometimes horrible things cannot be explained, but their debilitating effects can be weakened through deconstruction.

“On the wall, the shadows of their erections fall, then rise./We are rare in goodness, and rarer still in joy./Their clothes/return to them, like crumpled laws./He walks backwards as the soldier walks backward. They/smile at each other until both are out of sight. The night/returns to itself, less whole. The Maybelle Auto marquee a/beacon in the fog.” Thus ends one of his poems, “Künstlerroman.” It appears near the end.

Violence, war, tragedy, love, sex, death, spatial emptiness, emotional emptiness, terrains of all kinds, and the colors of nature and of night, among many other things, make up the ingredients of Vuong’s work. He finds a balance for everything wrong and right in the world.

Time is a Mother succeeds because it doesn’t play games with the reader or with itself. There is a deep search for justice, a cry like a voice out of the forest on the edge of town, that cuts into the air and holds. Where there is no justice found, Vuong’s poetry sticks around to remind the reader that justice is a stepping stone on the way to love — and that love makes us and unmakes us, over and over.