An anxious kind of boyish man stands on the egg cooking curb,
his shirt soaked in pod liquor grease, he likes to slow cook
like his bag of boiled peanuts he won't open.
I'll stand with him for one of those nubbly little meat
nuts. He sees me looking out with my sweatshirt on
and gives me a vegan smile. I turn back to my
baloney sandwich and bite it with my meat teeth.
I crank the mayonnaise caked bread to the roof
of my mouth. I let it warm up use my tongue to
ice shave it off. Now I have mushy bread that slips
slowly down my throat as I fog from the inside.
I truly enjoyed this work. The choices made with word-combinations are quite fascinating. Some of them are very weird yet I find it very refreshing.
ReplyDelete“egg cooking curb” - at first I thought that this could have been a typo but in closer inspection it seems like the poem is supposed to be this way. This simple switch between a what would have been a simple reading creates an atmosphere of wonder for the reader. It definitely sets up an aura of mischief which is successfully followed through the whole poem.
“bag of boiled peanuts he won’t open” – the level of specificity is simple yet creates a sense of mystery when “he won’t open “ is added. The reader automatically starts to wonder and question the mystery as to why this “boyish man” will not open the bag of peanuts.
“vegan smile” – is another interesting combination of words. For most people, they may have never come across anyone who are true vegans, but I have and vegans are very interesting people. Obviously they differ from one person to another but adding the characteristic of “vegan” to a “smile” adds another level of curiosity for the reader. The poem creates this cloud of mystery around the main character.
“meat nuts,” “meat teeth” – meat nuts for some reason, to me, had some sense of perverseness that makes me think as if the main character and the speaker have some kind of flirtation going on. It makes me imagine that the main character is some cool and calm vegan boy and the speaker is some tomboy and how she teases him and kind of pushes him outside of his boundary, and that the main character just allows the speaker to do so. “meat teeth” also adds on to that sense that the speaker (who I am assuming is a girl) is teasing the guy sort of like a “hey wuss, look at me! I eat meat!” kind of moment there.
The last four sentences finishes the whole era of tomboy vs vegan boy atmosphere. Words like “crank,” “mayonnaise” “roof of my mouth” carries on the drama between the two and how she is definitely showing off and teasing the boy as she eats a baloney sandwich like a boy should. “Mushy”,” tongue,” “slips slowly down my throat,” once again creates that slight level of perversion that caters more towards the flirtation that I assume.
I suggest on the 4th line, to take more of an assertive tone by simply removing the “I’ll” and just go ahead and say “I stand next to him.” The poem can also move forward by adding more specifics between the relationship between the vegan boy and the other character with the baloney sandwich. I automatically assumed it is a girl, but other readers may not. It could be a good thing to just leave the sex of the speaker anonymous to add to the mystery, but I think if it is more clear of what their relationship is like, or at least know if the speaker is a boy or a girl, it could add a whole new different meaning to the poem.
All in all a very wonderful piece. Definitely a refreshing and enjoyable read.
Samaria,
ReplyDeleteThis is a really neat piece. I like the way you create this tease between a vegan and a carinivora. You have a clever play on words which is fun to read. I don't know how I feel about "I let it warm up use my tongue to
ice shave it off. " It reads too fast for me and the words don't make sense like that. Maybe there needs to be a puncuation break or a re-write of the sentence? Perhaps "I let it warm up, use my tounge, and ice shave it off." I think it slows the reading and makes it sound more intresting and someone more of a carvinoristic tease towards the vegan. But really I love the way you used such rich words and descriptions in this piece. It was very fun.