Christiana Lloyd-Kirk's Review of Lauren Melissa Opperman's Sestina
Personally, I think there are some cool and some not so cool things going on in this poem. To just get the negative over with...Some of your grammar is kind of sloppy. If it was simply a matter of spelling I wouldn't mention it but the problem's a little more than that. "To be eased" does not make sense...(1.) It comes off redundant in that tense (since eased automatically insinuates that something or someone has been the catalyst already as opposed to ease which is a current state of being/has no insinuation attached). (2.) The tense doesn't work. "To be" is present. "Eased" is past tense. "to be at ease" would make more sense as a current state. "To be Eased" broken down, sounds like the person (or time) is saying, "be a state of mind I've already given you." It just doesn't make sense.
Some other things to consider:
(Ambitioners is not a real word. It's not that poets don't make up their own words at times (Language Poets especially do) but there's usually a system to what they do. In the case of Language poets...They love playing with sound and while their poems can be unintelligible, the sound is about as musical as it gets...and that's their trademark. That's what they're known for. Other poets do it when they're referring to Pop Culture or something over the top imaginative/otherworldly...(like the author of Alice and Wonderland, Lewis Carol when he came up with stuff like: Jabberwocky). When writers get away with made up words it's because there's a world or context surrounding them that makes the choice seem very purposeful and obvious/fitting. If there were a lot of other funky words/parts to the poem or you were playing with sound/puns...hell anything like that, I might buy that Ambitioners was very purposefully placed...but since that's not the case, it just kinda stands out like a sore thumb.
Now onto the good stuff...
I love how you voice everything from ambition and motivation to depression, agency and existential crisis. There's also some fabulous imagery...I especially love this bit, "There’s a difference between doers/and those who dream under smoke./ And writers can’t do/anything, but implode with scenes and colored words,"
"After high
recognition, we type justifications for poems, and steal time
to recenter on self-centered aspirations. "
(This left me with some questions...not good or bad really, but couldn't you make the argument that anything anyone does on the planet is self-centered in some way? Even people who do charity work or spend their careers at Amnesty International do it because it fufills them in some way. A writer can ask themselves the question, "What's the point of writing?" but anyone could ask an equivalent question if you really thought about it. People who work for Amnesty International....or cops, or doctors...They can all ask the same question because at the end of the day they are a drop in the ocean....They're never going to be able to rid the world of Human Rights Violations entirely...or save every young person gone before their time...or in any shape or form, permanently kill crime or the root cause of any of this. But if our writing engages and relates to any kind of audience, I have to think it's just as important a job. Those professions may seem like they have a more direct impact but they don't give people the will to live when they've been the victim of every crime imaginable or they've lost all the people they were closest to. They can't change the minds of people so broken everyone and everything is the enemy...In most respects, the choice to live and find something in living worthwhile...That's something we decide for ourselves. But people don't make that choice without something beautiful and powerful worth sticking around for. If writing is capable of anything..it's the depiction of those things. And it doesn't just refer to what we read either obviously. The very act of putting pen to paper is an act of agency and sometimes a lot of courage. We may continue to ask what it all means and not really come up with any answers....But having a voice and using it...however trivial it may seem is something to be proud of and also very essential. You may not have figured it all out but at least you have thoughts. You can't control life to a large extent but at least you're participating. More to the point, it is not your job to be everyone's end all/be all or be fucking inspirational. If you're honest and say whatever's going on well...that's all you really need to do to move people.
There are the simple folk, trapped ambitioners, that don’t do,
but know. I fear I am them every summer time
when I trade my trade for TV-timed fun and a high
passion for sinking into couches. I see the bright-cheeked doers
pass us, me and their ghost used-to-bes, and I’m such a has been, pretend
to be: somebody who knows what the pen takes
from you and offers more. There are times that take
you to the ink and you think “this is it.” It’s hard to do,
bleed blissfully bodied thoughts on the page, pretend
it means something more than the summer’s heat & I am stuck every time
trying to interchange feelings for words- I am no longer a doer.
I stay in comfort and nothingness while high
ambitions visit my friends. And it’s hard to get high
on pocket change and couch coins, it takes
destinations away from you. There’s a difference between doers
and those who dream under smoke. And writers can’t do
anything, but implode with scenes and colored words, and time
highlights: I am slow. Try to pretend
until you are- Can writers convince themselves? Pretend
they’re anything but their conceits? After high
recognition, we type justifications for poems, and steal time
to recenter on self-centered aspirations. But I take
too many excuses and make them my slogans. I don’t do
anything, but know. And I see those same doers
split into a dichotomy based on where I am- the doers
are fleshed before me but I see years I’ve never touched and I pretend
I am them. Though nothing is more crippling than the enigmatic those who do
in actions rather than time tested feelings and highs.
Know there was simplicity once, as the pen takes
to you, and I remember I was them, before time
told me to be eased and it tricked me. Time
lulled me and kissed me, until the doers
left me. And now it takes
days to write a dragged out draft- I pretend
I am a writer. One who thinks in full stanza highs
with “it’s all relative” lows; one who can do.
Simplicity is not an option to do. As time
starts around again, highs never drown the doers.
And I can’t pretend I have what it takes.
Some other things to consider:
(Ambitioners is not a real word. It's not that poets don't make up their own words at times (Language Poets especially do) but there's usually a system to what they do. In the case of Language poets...They love playing with sound and while their poems can be unintelligible, the sound is about as musical as it gets...and that's their trademark. That's what they're known for. Other poets do it when they're referring to Pop Culture or something over the top imaginative/otherworldly...(like the author of Alice and Wonderland, Lewis Carol when he came up with stuff like: Jabberwocky). When writers get away with made up words it's because there's a world or context surrounding them that makes the choice seem very purposeful and obvious/fitting. If there were a lot of other funky words/parts to the poem or you were playing with sound/puns...hell anything like that, I might buy that Ambitioners was very purposefully placed...but since that's not the case, it just kinda stands out like a sore thumb.
Now onto the good stuff...
I love how you voice everything from ambition and motivation to depression, agency and existential crisis. There's also some fabulous imagery...I especially love this bit, "There’s a difference between doers/and those who dream under smoke./ And writers can’t do/anything, but implode with scenes and colored words,"
"After high
recognition, we type justifications for poems, and steal time
to recenter on self-centered aspirations. "
(This left me with some questions...not good or bad really, but couldn't you make the argument that anything anyone does on the planet is self-centered in some way? Even people who do charity work or spend their careers at Amnesty International do it because it fufills them in some way. A writer can ask themselves the question, "What's the point of writing?" but anyone could ask an equivalent question if you really thought about it. People who work for Amnesty International....or cops, or doctors...They can all ask the same question because at the end of the day they are a drop in the ocean....They're never going to be able to rid the world of Human Rights Violations entirely...or save every young person gone before their time...or in any shape or form, permanently kill crime or the root cause of any of this. But if our writing engages and relates to any kind of audience, I have to think it's just as important a job. Those professions may seem like they have a more direct impact but they don't give people the will to live when they've been the victim of every crime imaginable or they've lost all the people they were closest to. They can't change the minds of people so broken everyone and everything is the enemy...In most respects, the choice to live and find something in living worthwhile...That's something we decide for ourselves. But people don't make that choice without something beautiful and powerful worth sticking around for. If writing is capable of anything..it's the depiction of those things. And it doesn't just refer to what we read either obviously. The very act of putting pen to paper is an act of agency and sometimes a lot of courage. We may continue to ask what it all means and not really come up with any answers....But having a voice and using it...however trivial it may seem is something to be proud of and also very essential. You may not have figured it all out but at least you have thoughts. You can't control life to a large extent but at least you're participating. More to the point, it is not your job to be everyone's end all/be all or be fucking inspirational. If you're honest and say whatever's going on well...that's all you really need to do to move people.
There are the simple folk, trapped ambitioners, that don’t do,
but know. I fear I am them every summer time
when I trade my trade for TV-timed fun and a high
passion for sinking into couches. I see the bright-cheeked doers
pass us, me and their ghost used-to-bes, and I’m such a has been, pretend
to be: somebody who knows what the pen takes
from you and offers more. There are times that take
you to the ink and you think “this is it.” It’s hard to do,
bleed blissfully bodied thoughts on the page, pretend
it means something more than the summer’s heat & I am stuck every time
trying to interchange feelings for words- I am no longer a doer.
I stay in comfort and nothingness while high
ambitions visit my friends. And it’s hard to get high
on pocket change and couch coins, it takes
destinations away from you. There’s a difference between doers
and those who dream under smoke. And writers can’t do
anything, but implode with scenes and colored words, and time
highlights: I am slow. Try to pretend
until you are- Can writers convince themselves? Pretend
they’re anything but their conceits? After high
recognition, we type justifications for poems, and steal time
to recenter on self-centered aspirations. But I take
too many excuses and make them my slogans. I don’t do
anything, but know. And I see those same doers
split into a dichotomy based on where I am- the doers
are fleshed before me but I see years I’ve never touched and I pretend
I am them. Though nothing is more crippling than the enigmatic those who do
in actions rather than time tested feelings and highs.
Know there was simplicity once, as the pen takes
to you, and I remember I was them, before time
told me to be eased and it tricked me. Time
lulled me and kissed me, until the doers
left me. And now it takes
days to write a dragged out draft- I pretend
I am a writer. One who thinks in full stanza highs
with “it’s all relative” lows; one who can do.
Simplicity is not an option to do. As time
starts around again, highs never drown the doers.
And I can’t pretend I have what it takes.