Response to Shattered

Shattered is about a mother of three whose husband has abandoned her and used their money to shack up with another woman in the Bahamas. This abandonment has caused severe financial difficulty for the mother and severe behavioral problems with her son. After some severe temper tantrums, the son's emotional problems are eventually overcome with medication. I wasn't really drawn into this story initially. The opening paragraph left something to be desired, with the confusingly placed "nestled" and the insinuation that if a husband wants to look at TVs while registering for gifts that there is something inherently wrong (although this did provide appropriate foreshadowing.) I like that she was so worked up that she forgot she had children to take care of. I feel like if this had been overdone, it could have come off as unbelievable, but the way the first child is introduced and the way the mother handles the situation make it work. In the next couple paragraphs there are some severe incongruities. The Narrator wonders whether the people at school or the other parents had noticed her children's shoddy appearance due to her stress and figured out what happened. She then states that it has been six months since the incident, yet they have moved twice. Unless these three different houses are in the same school district, which is unlikely due to the price discrepancies, no one would notice the change over the 6 months. The change in Jackson is described well, however the mothers reaction to it doesn't make much sense. While I got the feeling the mother didn't have much time for parenting, she insists on refusing his medication because she thinks she can fix him with her "constant love and attention." The ending is very curt and leaves me with many questions. Is everyone happy? Is this story "pro-medication" in some way? Why was Jackson convulsing? I left confused and unfulfilled.

Mmmm... Brownies

I didn't really like this story much until the very end when the truth about the white girls is revealed and Laurel tells the story about her father and the Mennonites. Otherwise I felt the story was narrated in an odd sort of way. The viewpoint was from a child, yet there are all these grown up similes and metaphors. Many of these similes also seemed kind of forced or out of place. A couple of examples that particularly bothered me are: "the voice one might expect from a shiny new earring," and "Ït demanded a few moments of silence in its wake, like the ringing of a church bell or the playing of taps" (505, 507). First of all, I have absolutely no reference for what a shiny new earring would sound like, and the reference to reverential silence is a bit lost on me when talking about a young bossy girls voice. There were also a few instances where I was confused about setting and had trouble getting any kind of image in my head. For instance, on page 506 she begins talking about how the sun was setting behind the trees, throwing lacy shadows, etc... But having no frame of reference for where they were, whether it be outside or inside, it was a little weird. There is even one point when they are walking directly into bright sunlight, then they turn around and see Daphne cleaning, her hair lit up as if it were back-lit. As someone who has tried to take pictures, back-lit or otherwise, I can tell you that this particular image and description don't really jive. Honestly, I did kind of like this story, I'm just being especially nit-picky. Overall I liked the plot and the twist, there were just a few (what I felt to be) sophomoric elements that detracted from the tale. I'm sure the Guggenheim and Granta would disagree with me, however. Thank goodness for personal opinion. The significance of the title being ""Brownies"was not lost on me either, since the story was about perceived racism.

Mmmmm... Brownies.

(Nutella Brownie Recipe)

Response to "The Things They Carried - The Gravity of War

I really enjoyed this story. I've been meaning to read the book for a while, and I'm glad I've finally been forced to at least read an excerpt. I noticed a couple of complaints about the specificity of his descriptions, how not everyone knows what all of these things are. I think that's intentional. Not only does war come with the overwhelming weight of all these things, but also war requires very specific knowledge and tools, tools that everyday people wouldn't or shouldn't know about. An average person at home may not know what a claymore mine is, or how it functions, and they don't need to, but a soldier damn well better. It comes with the territory, and although the average reader may not know what these items are, they should at least understand the inherent lethality and moral "weight" of carrying such an item. I really liked the way weight is used as a theme. Everything from the literal physical weight of things, to the weight of situational and moral strain, to the crushing weight of love. The connection between the weight of armament and the moral weight they added was a nice touch. It adds a significance to the fact that weapons typically make up a large portion of a soldiers gear.
The love story was interesting. The cold, mysterious virgin poet and the pining, day dreaming lieutenant. As a member of the armed forces, I can relate to his day dreaming on the job. On deployment I would sometimes catch myself zoning off thinking about my girlfriend at the time.

Response to "Take Your Bow" by Rozzy

I feel like this poem could be really good, but it lacks the feeling of a poem. It feels like a bunch of normal prose that has been placed in to a poem. There is a real lack of poetic language. The only places in the poem where I could find some interesting word choices was the crashing of applause through the silence, the subsequent crashing of reality, and the erasure of character, and I really liked these lines, I just wish there were more of it. Because of this, the "I remember, I remember" seems a little forced and out of place, although I do like how it splits the poem.
I really like the description of the friend on stage, it's easy to imagine the spotlight and the crowd and the happy actor, but again I just wish for a more unique description and a more vivid imagery. Also, maybe instead of I remember what it felt like, put "I remember what you looked like" or something similar. At first it seems like the speaker is the main actor and the main character. Maybe you were on stage at the same time, but it could potentially be a little confusing, and it takes away from the overall message. I would say that this poem has great potential, and with a little bit of careful wording and interesting description, could be very very good.

Those Hands - Analysis of Joshua Hutchinson's Poem

The structure of this poem was interesting as each stanza was kind of just a clump of a couple separate ideas.  I know that this is probably not good form, but I personally liked it. I feel like the structure lent a sense of independence to the poem, which is definitely what the author was going for, with each stanza standing on it's own. I feel like the idea of this independence goes a little too far though.Who doesn't have time to fix their child' boo boos? It's kind of harsh. Perhaps that is the point though, as the poem takes a very materialistic turn in the next couple stanzas, where the speaker begins to "count their own greenbacks" and change the tire of their "German-made" car. It feels like the speaker is just bragging, as German-made seems very forced into the poem. I understand the impulse to use these kinds of descriptions when talking about financial independence, but it comes off in the wrong way, and keeps the reader from relating to and liking the speaker. Another descriptor that seemed a little forced was "lime green". There really isn't a lot of description in the poem, and I feel like it would be stronger without it. I didn't really understand the choice of the two presidents either. Why Obama and Old Bush? I don't see the reasoning or political connection.

The Dog Following You Home - Response to Richard Tyler's Poem

I liked this poem a lot, but there was one thing that drove me crazy. The line breaks! Sometimes they were perfect, this stanza for instance, 

         I know better and

         I know best. For me

         that time is real. The truth

         is fossilized in the bedrock

         of my being

And sometimes they were a little confusing to me, like when a word would be left dangling at the end of a line. Sometimes it made sense there, like in the example above how "For me" works at the end of the previous line as well as the beginnning of the next. Unfortunately, sometimes it did not make sense: "I tuck it away, stuff / it out of sight. Again..." I often do the same thing in my poetry because it seems dramatic and poetic but it's often just confusing and makes it harder to read. This poem had some really awesome metaphors. The comparison of the story they tell as proof of past happiness to evidence for the trial was cool. Using the word proof here was a good choice. Another image and metaphor I liked was the image of the masked killer as a persistent dog following you home, something you can't shake. And in the final lines I thought the image of the ink from the picture flowing through his hands onto paper was really effective and a great ending.

Response to Curtis Mize's "Onward"

My dad was a super Civil War buff, so I got this right off the bat, although I'm sure someone unacquainted with civil war history would be able to easily figure out the subject matter as well (considering the bayonets, Virginia, etc.). In this way it was very clear what we were reading. Curt's poem is full of typical battlefield images, but he manages to keep them from being too played out by using very unique language to describe the scenes, such as, "nameless meat piled to absorb / searing lead meant for another." Still, maybe he could have described a few things that we usually wouldn't think of on a battlefield, or maybe something that would have made the scene more quintessentially "civil-war" or Irish. The imagery of "the field is more / bodies than grass / blood than dirt" was very effective in illustrating the horrible massacre, and I feel like the line breaks here also help chop up the image in such a way that makes it more effective. It was good how there was a sort of shift in the tone as the poem progressed. Initially, with the angrily snapping satin standard (Words not in this order, but I liked these two lines for their alliteration and consonance) the Irish seem proud, wrathful, and intimidating, but they come to be cowering behind a wall being picked off one by one. I think when Curtis speaks of the "fresh ice through frozen veins" he means the Irish are scared, but one could easily interpret them as being cool and fearless. Overall, I liked the poem, but maybe a little more description of unique battlefield images is in order.