Stains: Early Poems by Lori A. May

Reviewed by Eric Weinstein

ISBN 978-0-9735824-0-6
Bohemian Steel Press, 2009

May’s fourth collection of poems, stains, is a strange beast: on the one hand, “early poems” connotes a substantial body of poetry, just as a memoir implies significant life experience; on the other, May’s body of work doesn’t appear extensive or impressive enough to warrant such a designation. Indeed, the book is published by the mysterious Bohemian Steel Press, which has apparently only published four books— naked, de(con)struction, Cross My Heart, and stains: early poems—all poetry collections by Lori May.

It is difficult to ignore the possibility that the addition of “early poems” to the title may simply be an attempt to avoid serious criticism. This is understandable, as the collection itself does not stand up well to scrutiny: the poems are very rough, juvenile at their worst and aggressively mediocre at their best, characterized by a choppy, stilted line in desperate need of proper breaks and guilty of an overly simplistic rhyme scheme. From the second poem, “brat”: “father noticed / and called me near / scorned matter of / disrespect made clear.” One might argue that this is intentional, being part of the clumsy evolution from childhood to adulthood, but this is not the case: the penultimate poem, “the beach,” reads in part, “lapping applause from the lake / will lull us into bliss, / accentuating our first summer kiss.” Adulthood sounds exactly like childhood, and it shouldn’t.

The book is superficially divided into seven sections named after substances that commonly stain (grass, coffee, blood, et cetera). The overall arc of the book makes sense, starting with “grass” and ending with “sweat”—a transformation I take to indicate the development from the playground of childhood to the work (or perhaps the bedroom) of adulthood—but the other sections seem to appear in random order, and the poems found in each are often only tangentially related to the section of the collection in which they are housed.

In terms of subject matter and thematic development, May only grazes the surface of the complexities involved in childhood rebellion, adolescent love, and the relationships that exist between the two. No risks are taken, no leaps are made, no surprises are revealed in stains: early poems. “Early” or not, there seems to be nothing that sets these published poems apart from the legion poems that go unpublished every year.

Prick of the Spindle poetry editor Eric Weinstein’s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Best New Poets 2009, Third Coast, and Colorado Review. He lives in Hoboken, New Jersey.

© 2009 prickofthespindle.com