Aesthetics vs. Beliefs/Morality in "The Boys"

Watching "The Boys" is rather mesmerizing. It is an interesting, dark, acerbic take on the superhero phenomenon--a long awaited critique. Warning: the show is violent and gruesome.

One of the intriguing promises was the use (or abuse) of religion, but it was at best disappointing as the writer seemed unaware there's actually a whole philosophical/narrative thread behind people's beliefs. There are reasons why people believe what they believe. Every speaker at that two-dimensional cardboard cut-out religious conference would have been analyzed and picked apart, critiqued by a host of religious leaders--on TV, on the radio, on the internet.

Where characters like Starlight eventually wind up with their beliefs matters less than presenting coherent belief systems--that is, when we're talking objectivity and aesthetics which, of course, differs from personal beliefs. This is something that people have lost the ability to do--to separate art from belief. That inability leads to a loss of objectivity. A loss of objectivity also leads to a less meaningful critique of the art. To critique "X," you have to inhabit X. You have to put it within its proper context. Otherwise, you're critiquing either nothing or something else entirely (hence, the new addendum I added above, so I wouldn't have to repeat myself).

Now if Starlight has been involved with religion, she would have to know the philosophical and narrative framework of that religion. She would speak to that framework. She'd work within and/or against that framework. If she doesn't, it's like being thirteen and claiming to have been at Woodstock. As is, it is impossible to believe anyone at the conference has anything but a superficial knowledge of religion.

It's like putting cacti, camels, mirages, sand dunes and horse chases in the middle of New York City and pretending it's a serious critique of today's NYC. It doesn't make sense.

To critique a thing, you have to understand it. Remove the proper context, you remove the critique. (This is not to say that morals are not important, but you can't discuss art meaningfully unless it's on a level playing field, with terms people agree upon. You can't communicate unless people are speaking the same language. Otherwise, the quality of art would depend solely on whether it matches your particular belief system, which may change.)

Still, I finished the season. Hopefully, if they do anything more with religion, it will make sense.

Top 20 Dwarf Star Poems

Disclosure: I have a poem in here and am pleased to be included. I won’t suggest where or if it belongs on any of these levels. Readers can judge for themselves. I link to it at the bottom. It’s part of a whole suite of moon poems that accrue meaning. For interested parties, I’ll include other poems of that series that I can find online, so they can get a feel for how they fit together.

Observations on the top 20:

I organized the poems into groups although I could see them sliding up or down according to one’s taste. I was definitely surprised to find three of my top four to be haiku. I love haiku, but they’re rarely done well. These are not only emotionally potent but carry double duty.

Forms that slip from prose poem to haiku, so far, seem better without the haiku.

The list in the admirable middle group could be argued to be higher. They generally capture something of a feeling or thought that resonated with me. John C. Mannone’s is clever, but I feel it operates at a higher level, especially as it takes one voice and transforms it into another.

Once again Star*Line has the most representatives here with five (a quarter of the representatives!). Scifaikuest has three, and Troutswirl has two, both in the top group. Again, I don’t try to balance gender, but it is awfully close. Bruce Boston and F. J. Bergmann are the only poets to appear in the top Rhysling and Dwarf Stars while Christina Sng is the only poet to have two good ones in one.

It will be interesting to see how others vote on these poems.

Note 1: Within each group, poems are organized alphabetically by title.

Note 2: If I can find the poem online, a link will be provided. I had a hard time locating most.

The Mid 8

• “all my nightmares,” Christina Sng, Scifaikuest (online), November 2018.
• “emerging,” Christina Sng, Colorado Boulevard, August 2018.
• “empty house,” Maryalicia Post, Ribbons 14:3.
• Failing Masterpiece, Bruce Boston, Star*Line 41.1.
• “the little girl stopped,” Jennifer Hambrick, Atlas Poetica: 25 Science Fiction Tanka and Kyoka, eds. Julie Bloss Kelsey & Susan Burch.
• Men on Mars and Witches from Venus, John C. Mannone, Tales from the Moonlit Path, November 2018.
• News Update, Herb Kauderer, Star*Line 41.3.
• Rapunzel, F. J. Bergmann, Abyss & Apex, January 1, 2018.

The Top 4:

• “crash of waves,” Paul Geiger, Troutswirl, July 18, 2018.
• The Everlasting Self, Tracy K. Smith, Wade in the Water (Graywolf Press, 2018).
• “ocean swim,” Peter Jastermsky, Troutswirl, August 1, 2018
• “return trip,” Julie Bloss Kelsey, Scifaikuest (print), May 2018.

The Clever 8:

• cannibalizing parts, Lauren McBride, Scifaikuest (print), November 2018.
• Ghazal, Joshua Gage, Star*Line 41.2.
• Everything started with the Big Bang, they say, Juanjo Bazán, Star*Line 41.2.
• The Evolutionary Race, Peter Payack, Asimov’s SF, March/April 2018.
• “moebius strip,” Lucy Whitehead, Otata 33.
• The Pillars of Creation, Jason Gray, Literary Matters 11.1.
• “There was an A.I.…,” Robert Dawson, Star*Line 41.4.
• where to hide an alien in plain sight, LeRoy Gorman, Scryptic 2:4.

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Trent Walters, Man on the Moon poems online, the first is the nominee. The others are part of the poetic suite.

Life on the Moon v1.0, Trent Walters, Red FlagPoetry,  

Life on the Moon v.2.0 Right Hand Pointing (about half way down, formatting off--for formatting, see first poem)

O Moon (Self/Coda) Menacing Hedge

O Moon (Jehovah)  Lune

O Moon (Shakespeare) Lune

Cassandra Rose Clarke: The Mad Scientist's Daughter

The Mad Scientist's Daughter 

by Cassandra Rose Clarke 

Angry Robot

In a post-ecological-disaster world, Cat has been her own teacher, wandering nature. But her dad, a cyberneticist, brings home Finn, a being Cat initially took for a ghost. Finn becomes her teacher, a great resource for stories, math and science. At a party it becomes clear Finn is a robot although Cat remains convinced of his being a ghost until he admits what he is.

As she gets older, she becomes more and more fond of Finn. She gets in a fight at school with a kid who calls Finn an "it." She dates other boys, but they are all dis-satisfactory. One night she kisses Finn with disastrous consequences. Her father doesn't seem to buy her excuses but also doesn't seem to mind, either.

She goes to college. Her mother dies, and there is a see-saw between Finn and human lovers.

While it isn't heavily science fiction, it is SF--hypnotically told. Although Clarke's exploration of tropes is limited, she can tell a good tale. Because of the romantic nature and the serious treatment of romancing an AI, the novel doesn't seem well named except for her father's reaction to her kiss (not that he knows for certain what happened--or does he?). What's fascinating is what remains unstated but holds Cat's riveted to Finn. It must be unquestioning devotion. Even when she takes on other lovers, he does not. He remains faithful and hurries to her side when he's needed.

The narrator voice opens wonderfully childlike, aging as the narrator ages, and the detail is precise and evocative. The story title is predated by one written by Theodora Goss (I reviewed it as part of this JJ Adams' Mad Scientist anthology). They seem to have little overlap, and this has a stronger narrative thread, perhaps due to focusing on one character and being a novel.

I don't read many love stories as I don't find them realistic. Strange then that I was taken in by this one with an automaton. The ending did push character credibility, but still recommended if you're in the mood for a good storyteller.

Blake's 7

When Paul Darrow recently died, I decided to revisit the series, Blake's 7, one of the first SF TV series to have a grand narrative

The Set-up: 

Roj Blake is invited to a meeting of political dissidents undermining the Federation. They tell him that he used to a major rebel against the Federation, but he's had his memories erased. He struggles with this and goes off on his own, only to witness, helplessly as Federation troops massacre the twenty defenseless dissidents.

Blake is caught and made to look like a child molester. His defense lawyer doesn't believe Blake's claim until he looks at the records himself. Meanwhile, Blake is shipped off to a penal colony. En route, the Federation guards get greedy when they find an empty ship, full of alien technology. After a few guards die under mysterious circumstances, they send a few prisoners aboard to claim the ship, rescue or find out what happened to the guards, so as not to lose further, vital crew.

The Good

What's working is this disparate crew--misfits, forced to align in order to circumvent the Federation. Some of them are true criminals. It's hard to know who to trust and how far.

They also have this alien technology they have to learn to use.

The best may be the suggested narrative arc in the first season when Terry Nation was writing. He did create narrative threads that were better used later (e.g. telepathy), but we had a sense that this would be a big tale.

Tanith Lee wrote a few episodes, including a somewhat odd tale called, "The Sand."

The very last episode of the series ends in the same way as a famed Western movie less than a decade old at the time. It's interesting and disappointing at the same time.

The Bad 

After season one, any pretense of a grand narrative is abandoned except "Federation bad, we good." The viewer is best advised to watch season one as what-might-have-been, and then watch the rest as tales of a never-ending space opera--watch less for arcs than episodes although some pretense is made toward continuity. The end of season four makes an interesting finale but a somewhat sloppy way to tie off loose ends. The series actually seems to build toward the opposite thematic conclusion, but it's still interesting.

The characters that were forced together still stick together although based on their original characters, they should have abandoned one another long before. Their character natures are abandoned for episodic plots.

The writers have no sense of gravity in particular, physics in general.

Comparisons

This reminded me of the promise of the first season of Orphan Black, which when it got hugely popular, it had come up with more and more absurd ways to further the plot. Milk milk milk the dead cow. Murdered by its own success. Blake's 7, however, abandons any idea of a grand plot. Was it ever intended to be a grand plot? It's hard to say.

Apparently a new Blake's 7 is in the works, according to IMDb, but hopefully it doesn't fall for the same trap as its predecessor--a victim of success.

Review: Short by Holly Goldberg Sloan

Short

by Holly Goldberg Sloan

PENGUIN GROUP Penguin Young Readers Group

Dial Books

Children's Fiction , Middle Grade

As a kid, after school, I'd stop by Mom's classroom, and if she didn't have me grading her papers or cutting something out or cleaning something up, I read her books. At first my favorites were the ones with unreal illustrations. Eventually, I grew curious about the ones I avoided. Sometimes I was right, sometimes not,

I like 99.9% of kids and kids' books are like a dip back into childhood. Some writers like Neil Gaiman and L. Frank Baum have special voices that tease and charm back the magic of childhood from you.

So my primary desire is to fall in love with every kid's book--although I obviously prejudices that favor the imaginative variety.

This one starts out promisingly as the child protagonist is irked by her parents' comment that it's good that she's a short female, rather than a short male, but the story gets derailed for two chapters as she meanders, visits the piano lady and her brother without promising a goal or a problem that gets tackled except indirectly.

The voice has some charm in the sense that complainers can have for a short time but lacks full development. Maybe it's too much to ask for a child to be developed as a character.

This didn't click for me until our protagonist gets accepted as a munchkin in the play for The Wizard of Oz--and really only when Shawn Barr shows up, a director who is short, along with those affected by dwarfism. Plenty of readers found it worthwhile. If you do get bogged down, try skipping ahead to chapter 3.

Review: The Man in the Next Bed by David K. Shipler

The Man in the Next Bed
by David K. Shipler
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Vintage
General Fiction (Adult)

David K. Shipler won the Pulitzer and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for nonfiction. This, however, a foray into fiction, claimed to be his first, is an impressive assault. It probably falls somewhere between a short story and novelette.

Gibson has been diagnosed with cancer. He jokes with the nurses and doctors, some of whom laugh, others either don't get it or ignore it. He gets a roommate added to the room. The roomie has been bleeding from the anus and the doctors and nurses are concerned, but he doesn't do needles, he says. Meanwhile the young man who feels obligated to tell his mother, and instantly regrets it.

This is the story of how two men process illness differently. It's a good story with an ending that's perhaps more ambiguous than the author intended. Nonetheless, it's a moving work. There's also an attention to detail, to reality that makes the story feel this could be us in the hospital, which possibly explains Shipler's awards.

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This is not a story that lends itself to spoiling since it is the whole experience. I do want to talk about the ending in the vaguest sense. Still maybe read the story first before reading further critique/analysis.

For those who have read the story, here's a top-secret link that only cool people like yourself has access to.

Review Dark Screams: Volume Two, edited by Richard Chizmar, Brian James Freeman

Dark Screams: Volume Two 

by Robert R. McCammon; Richard Christian Matheson; Graham Masterton; Norman Prentiss; Shawntelle Madison 

ed. Richard Chizmar, Brian James Freeman 

Random House Publishing Group - Hydra 

General Fiction (Adult)

The Deep End • Robert R. McCammon

Glenn Calder lost his son Neil two weeks ago in the town's Olympic swimming pool. It didn't strike him immediately, but there was a strange mark on his neck, and the fact that someone has died in the pool several years running. And then fortuities and insights occur to him such that  he plans to go after the creature himself.

Good story. It won the Stoker award.

Interval • by Norman Prentiss

The airline Michelle works for is undergoing bankruptcy. Meanwhile, flight 1137 is delayed. People keep inquiring, but t he status is blank. It merely says "announcement forthcoming." No one knows what it means, but they expect the worst. The delay lengthens... unnecessarily it seems between when something goes wrong and when they tell people about it. Something is lapping this all up.

Good if coy for a tad too long.

If These Walls Could Talk • by Shawntelle Madison

Eleanor has arrived at a three-story Victorian house to set up a shoot for  America's Mysterious Hotspots. The plaster is crumbling in places, and in trying to clean it up they find a body that had been missing for years. They rush to call the cops. But people keep disappearing.

Nice title. Horrifying ending image worthy of something Poe might do. It could have better telegraphed, with more background. The reasoning does not yet resonate.

The Night Hider • Graham Masterton

Dawn wakes from a dream of sleigh bells to a burned man standing in her room. She manages to escape the first time, but will she again when he appears the next night?

This was my favorite. Some good stories here, but this one was really creepy.

Whatever • Richard Christian Matheson

A band named Whatever hit the music scene with a splash, hitting the world with lyrics with serious intent.

Matheson is one of my favorites--the voice and usually creepy stuff. Interesting but maybe I was looking for a certain kind of horror that this didn't strike me. Or maybe the horror that was here should have shown up earlier and traced what that might have meant.

A good collection, worthy of your delectation, assuming your delectation follows horror. Perhaps this bodes well for the rest of the series.

Review: The Planet Thieves by Dan Krokos

The Planet Thieves

by Dan Krokos 

Starscape 

Macmillan-Tor/Forge 

Children's Fiction , Sci Fi & Fantasy

This won the Hal Clement (Golden Duck) Award for YA SF fiction.

Cadet Mason Stark boarded the SS Egypt with seventeen of his fellow cadets from the Academy for Earth Space Command. It was supposed to be a routine trip, so he sneaked off to where he wasn't supposed to be to pull a prank on his sister. Except suddenly there's a red alert indicating the Tremist were near. The Tremist were aliens who had been at war with humanity for sixty years.

Stark is caught and sent to the brig. A friend springs him as the battle isn't leaning toward the humans. He, Tom, and Merrin grab projectile weapons and sneak up on the Tremist kind who is gloating over the vanquished humans, demanding to know where the "weapon" is. The cadets launch into battle but their weapons have little effect. The king's armor just seems to absorb the energy. All seems lost, but Mason has a few tricks up his sleeve and gets a Tremist suit of his own. Can he and his cadets be enough to turn the tide against the Tremist?

I picked this one for its fantastic pulpy title alone. Pure genius. It's a thrill a minute--perfect for readers who want high-impact, high energy narratives.  Here's a sample to get a feel for it:

Tom waited for them in the elevator, holding it open with his arm. “Get in!” he hissed. 

Just as the talon stopped cutting into the wall. 

“Shh, quiet,” a man’s voice said from down the corridor. “Listen.” But Mason knew there could be no men left; the chuffing sounds the P-cannons made had faded to silence. So who had spoke? It didn’t matter: facing the Tremist unarmed would help no one. Mason and Merrin padded toward the elevator as quietly as they could. Now he wanted to run, but their footsteps would give away their presence. 

Then the ship’s computer, Elizabeth, said, “Cadet Renner, please stop blocking the elevator door.” 

Mason and Merrin jumped into the elevator and spun in time to see three Tremist charge around the corner. They were at full sprint, faster than he thought men could move. Their plate armor shimmered wetly, shifting between purple and black, catching the sterile light of the spaceship and making it alien. Mason saw his own face in the flat mirrored surface that was the leading Tremist’s faceplate. 

Tom had moved his arm, but the door was still open. They were only thirty feet away now. 

“Shut the door!” Mason yelled, pressing himself against the wall. 

“Thank you,” Elizabeth replied airily, and the door began to shut. 

The three Tremist paused when they realized they wouldn’t make it in time, and then lifted the talons to their shoulders. The soldier part of Mason’s brain, the part that didn’t get afraid, noted the angle at which the Tremist held their weapons, how, in the next second, each beam would slice through them at the breastbone.

The door sealed; Mason dragged Merrin and Tom to the floor as the talons’ green beams crisscrossed through the door and heated the air above them until it was crackling. Then the car descended, giving the illusion of the beams rising up through the door until they disappeared through the ceiling. 

The air was hot and baked and smelled like electricity. 

The door opened on the next level down, into a corridor identical to the one they just left.  

Tom had his dataslate plugged into a port on the elevator. “Erasing our destination level . . . now! Bought us a few minutes.” 

Merrin took the pad out of his hand. Her fingers danced over the screen until it flashed red. “There—the elevator is frozen.”

I loved it, but did wish for a little wider scope or canvas. There is some bogus science here--about a planet throwing off the balance of gravity in a solar system, but oh well. The novel's a blast and hopefully it will encourage kids to stretch their imaginations and maybe investigate the sciences.

There's a second book in the series where Mason is on edge of getting kicked out of Academy II for defending cadets from bullies. Fun stuff. Fingers crossed that more in this series are forthcoming.

Interview with Sarah O'Brien, editor of Boston Accent Lit

A review of Sarah O'Brien's debut chapbook was reviewed here.

When did you first start writing poetry? Did a teacher or family member inspire and encourage you?

I have been writing poetry since I was 8-years-old. Each year, I would write a poem to go inside our family Christmas card. I remember one starting, “Winter days are frigid, cold. / Warm cocoa in our hands we hold.” I won a state-wide poetry contest in second grade and attended an awards ceremony that motivated me.  

My grandfather encouraged my four sisters and me to tell stories. We would have “Story Time,” narrating made-up tales that would quickly become absurd. I loved reading Shel Silverstein’s poetry books. Often I would write songs and sing them poorly into a tape recorder. I wrote short fiction and ideas for novels. I wrote plays and performed them with my sisters. I kept journals. I was always writing something. 

Do you still find yourself interested in story or are you more interested in the lyric form (or both equally)? What do you see as their relative strengths?

I am interested in story, both in prose and in poetry. I find that the strength of prose writing is that it allows readers to become immersed in a character or characters, and although I create characters sometimes while writing poetry, I cannot explore these personas to the same extent that I can when writing fiction. Poetry is strong for its brevity. There are epic poems and such, but I like that a poem can offer emotional impact and a glimpse of truth in a small amount of space. Each word matters in a poem, and slight changes in punctuation or form can change the poem’s meaning entirely. With fiction, there are certain expectations the reader has from the story: a conflict, a setting, a resolution, a logical sequence of events… Fiction writers can play with these expectations, but poets can break the “rules” entirely and offer something completely unexpected. I like breaking lines and rules. 

In a few poems you point out your ethnic background. Does being Irish inform your work? 

My father is Irish and my mother is mostly Lebanese. However, we had an Irish-Catholic upbringing, which meant overcooked food, sarcasm over sentimentality, and mandatory Sunday church service. I enjoy Lebanese food, and wish I knew how to speak or write in Arabic.  

My Irish identity tends to overpower the rest of my background because my last name is unavoidably Irish and my skin is undeniably pale, especially compared to my Lebanese cousins’ skin tone in the summer. I think that my identity is heavily entwined with my poetry, such as with my sense of humor.

Where does (if it does) the Lebanese aspect come out in your poetry?

Perhaps in my romanticism of ordinary events. I’ll romanticize that time the librarian said “have a nice day” and the excellent sandwich I ate in Positano and I’ll definitely romanticize the way the moon was still visible this morning against the bright blue sky.

What poets inspire you? Who do you pull down when you're ready to write?

I love so many, including Maya Angelou, Elizabeth Bishop, Lucille Clifton, Nikki Giovanni, Louise Glück, Yusef Komunyakaa, Adrienne Rich, Mary Ruefle, Bianca Stone, and Ocean Vuong. Emily Dickinson is classic. Langston Hughes is honest. Sylvia Plath is smarter than me. Kristin Chang’s poetry is beautiful. Kaveh Akbar, Rae Armantrout, Dorothy Chan, Cortney Lamar Charleston, Safia Elhillo, and Ilya Kaminsky are brilliant. Chen Chen is hilarious. Many slam poets stun me, such as Cassandra Myers and Mia S. Willis. My writer friends inspire me the most because they consistently present an authentic voice and take poetic risks.

What do you mean by "poetic risks"? 

They are unafraid to try something new on the page. They are brave. For example, my friend Giselle Bonilla recently released a poem dedicated to survivors of abuse called “Breathe,” and it reads like a meditation on reclaiming one’s worth: “Name your pain. / It’s yours. / Have a conversation with it /... / Reconstruct that pain, / Make it into love. / Make it beautiful.” 

What draws you to love in a poem? Is it your muse, your backseat driver, or...?

Ha, my backseat driver. I’d say it’s more like love is driving me. I’m the one in the passenger seat, trying to work the GPS instead of just enjoying the view. For me, love is the purpose of life (not quite the “burden of life,” as Allen Ginsberg writes). Its power fascinates me: love can transform and conjure and create. 

The poems trace unrequited love, in particular. How does that make poetry so powerful? 

My favorite poet of “unrequited” love is Rumi. I use quotation marks because I don’t think it is unrequited love as much as it is love that had been one thing in the past and became a different sort of energy over time. 

Any ventures in love have ultimately led me to a greater understanding of myself. Self-love is a difficult journey and, although it isn’t well-publicized as such, it is the most important one we must undertake. 

Poetry is a way of grappling with such mysteries as love and a way to remind people of their own power. Poetry allows us to connect through our common emotional experiences.

How has your work as an editor informed and transformed your poetry?

I feel inspired to write whenever I read a strong piece of writing, so it’s exciting to be exposed to a plethora of wonderful work through running Boston Accent Lit. I am honored to have published the poetry of talented people—such as jayy dodd, Sneha Subramanian Kanta, Preeti Vangani, shy watson, and Alina Ştefănescu—poets who teach me new ways to use image or metaphor or tone and who hold me in a state of awe. 

What do you look for in a poem?

I like surprise and humor in poetry, but what I look for is emotional honesty. I love poets who show vulnerability on the page. 

What turns you off in poems?

I am turned off by erasure poetry; it evokes censorship too much for my taste.

Your poems often resist closure. Do you like closure in poetry or avoid it? Why?

I don’t think that poems should give closure; there is no needed solution to a presented problem like there is in fiction. Poems are instead intended to leave readers with a feeling, even if the feeling is frustration.

However, the final line of any poem needs to have a kick to it. I like to think of the last line as being similar to the punch line of a joke. It’s what we’re all waiting for, even if we don’t yet know it. It’s what makes you want to read the poem again or share it with someone else. Take James Wright’s “Lying in a Hammock at William Duffy’s Farm in Pine Island, Minnesota” as an example: the poem builds to its final line (“I have wasted my life”).  

A poem can be altogether awful, but if that last line is good enough then it can save the entire piece and elevate it to a work of art.

You recently got an MFA. Was it beneficial? How so?

Shout-out to the University of Nebraska-Omaha. UNO was the only poetry program I applied to because I felt called to the heartland. I am so happy that I pursued my MFA because my poetry skills improved substantially through focused attention and mentorship. The program’s low-residency format gave me the right balance of freedom and structure. I needed to refine my writing voice and I needed to learn to take myself seriously as a poet. Eventually, I will teach poetry courses, but for now I still feel that I have a lot to learn. 

What were some important takeaways from your time at the MFA?

Trust your vision and your voice as a writer, but also listen to others’ good advice. Before my MFA, I was writing poetry exclusively in lowercase letters because I thought it was avant-garde, but I learned that it was actually putting my poems at a disadvantage and somewhat confusing readers. My mentors also encouraged me to be more honest in my work and to avoid distancing myself from my writing by using a second-person perspective or ghost personas.


How did this collection come together? How did you select and order the poems? Any personal anecdotes about the collection?

I have been working on a full-length collection called Life Span of a Poet in Love and this chapbook contains a lot of new material that had been part of that project and then morphed into its own entity. I think that there are other poems that dance with the poems in Dancing on a Dead-End Street, but I wanted to keep the book short and sweet.

The poems told me which order they wanted to be in, so I just listened, and then I also listened to my sister Alice O’Brien who told me to switch the order of “South Dakota” and “Traveling,” since she felt that “Traveling” made more sense as the collection’s first poem. “Book Mail” and “Traveling” were originally not included in the collection, but I decided to add them because they felt important to the book’s tone and themes.

I have many personal anecdotes, but I think I’ll keep them to myself for now. I’m toying with the idea of writing nonfiction. I mean, I have written a couple of pieces and I am deciding whether I feel daring enough to share them. As T.S. Eliot writes, “Do I dare / Disturb the universe?”


What's next for you?

I plan to obtain my PhD in English and then teach poetry at the college level. I am working on a full-length poetry collection. This summer, I'll be making art and reading poems in the New England area.

Review: Dancing on a Dead-End Street by Sarah O'Brien

An interview with Sarah O'Brien will appear here on 7/2/2019.

Sarah O'Brien, editor of Boston Accent Lit, is a bare-faced poet. A character tells her persona:

we wear hearts on
our arms, that’s what
makes an Irishman.

Note: not sleeves, but arms--even closer than one's sleeve.

Her persona goes through "a menagerie of moans"--moans of physical pain, sexual pleasure, and lost love. She pines like Dante or Yeats for an unrequited love, who cannot seem to love her in the way she wants love and yet that barrier doesn't stop her from loving--despite or because of his marriage to someone else.

Sometimes the love is enough, sometimes not. "You can’t scandalize me," she writes to the "American Jackal." In "Write Back Soon" as the title suggests she feels conflicted, speaks of her dog's "whimpering.... abandonment issues," sweet talks with metaphor of her being toast and melted butter (she is melting and causing the melting) and ends by warning the lover to "keep your distance." Likewise, in an untitled poem she "send[s] love into the universe / without a return address" and at expects "something good" but ends up expecting "nothing good."

A few titles demarcate what's best about these verses:

• If There Is Something to Say, Say It 
• Silent Treatment in Salem
• Instead of Killing Myself ("offer my body to any mosquito")

Some lines are inspired:

I love weirdness like when a boy
reaches across me to scratch a blue wall. 

When I want to see if a plant is real,
I feel its leaves: fake. 

What are your intentions, gardener?
What will you grow with all this time? 

[from "With All This Time"]

and

If I leave this poem early
will you come back to 

[from "Irish Goodbye" which segues into the next poem "Twist" and its multiple senses]

The poems are her persona's life and livelihood as she points in "Love Letter to Late Capitalism." Just when she  thinks "When I Think I’m Out of Poems," an older woman finds a lost necklace and asks the persona to put it on and "she turns the corner."

But the best poem is "Time Zone":

I love long walks on clichés.
You want me to hear home
walking on Main Street.
I homed here in the past tense.
You never visited. 

In past tense, I ask a man to bed:
No labels heavy like a weighted blanket.
No fingering the sheets
as I touch tongue to collarbone.
You think I’m easy. Well, fuck. I am. 

My black boots make me famous.
I leave dignity at the baggage claim,
craving conversation in clouds.
You’re only halfway meeting me anywhere.
I wanna be caught by absolute surprise.

If you long for the ache of hunting and being haunted by love, Sarah O'Brien's Dancing on a Dead-End Street [link to chapbook] may cure what ails you.