Black Life, Dorothea Lasky

"I am not what I once was, but who would want to be" 

Black Life, Dorothea Lasky (Wave 2010). I've been meaning to write about this collection for weeks, but I'm dumbstruck. As I mentioned before, I saw her read not long ago with Geoffrey Nutter when I had just begun her book. I wanted to talk to her afterward, but she was surrounded by a pod of bearded men that shied me away. If I had spent as much time then reading and re-reading the collection as I have now, I would have worn a fake beard, or something, to get into that circle and have a word or two with her. Not that I could ask her any questions or get any kind of guidance from her words that isn't already in the poems. I guess I would want to see if the sort of mystical power in her collections translates into the way she is daily. She reads her poem's in a loud monotone that I first encountered here. It takes some getting used to, but I think it's worth it. How do you get a ticket to that living room? 

Lasky creates poem after poem that is "like a sparkly ring/ glittering at different points as the light hits it" (Awe, "The Sign Element and the Ability of the Speech Animal"), but that seems to reduce the sort of life that they have.  The other reductive thing I've heard said and seen written about Lasky is that her poems are "conversational." They do contain names—like the beautiful and darkly funny pairing of "Mike, I had an Affair," which begins, "Mike, I had an affair/ with Jakob Tushinea, the poet," and the poem on the opposing page, "Jakob"—and a majority of the lines are straightforwardly written, but "conversational" is the wrong word, just as "personal" is the wrong word. People don't say "O" in conversation, it's a word, like the rest of the ejaculations, that's all but died in contemporary poetry precisely because it "isn't something people say." Lasky, cutting against this, not only uses it, but uses it to great emotional effect often, like in "Yellowbird":

O gentle me the men in suspenders

O gentle moon that rose so 

or "Just Me and the Otters":

There is no song or poem I could sing to you

That would make me seem more beautiful

If there were such songs I would sing them

O they would hear me singing from here until dawn

Likewise, the poems are far too intense to be called "personal," but I think that it would be easy for a reader to imagine that they are. It's hard to describe what the poems convey without resorting to religious terminology (which Lasky, by the way, employs often and gorgeously) like "soul" or the obvious one, "awe." Whatever self that comes across in Black Life is deeper than any ordinary, personal "I." To steal another Lasky line, the poems are "longing made into flesh" (Awe, "You Ain't Gonna Get Glory If That's What You Came Here For") But how can you say that, stripped and bare like I just did, and have it not hurt your stomach a little? The only way to say something like that is to not say it entirely straightforwardly, but construct it in a poem. Lasky's two collections do this constantly. They create mirror-moments where a line means exactly what the poem actively constructs, and it's the active construction of the feeling that really matters. 

I don't think Lasky sees God as some separate watcher-over of the universe. I think she sees God in things—the deep power in objects and people that is beyond what we see. In "How to Survive in this World," I believe her when she writes "Atheists are all over this world and they are such idiots/ To think that they are the ones who know what is really going on in the world/ I know what's going on in the world/ When I hear Puffy's sweet voice I just pretend/ I don't know he's a saint, but he is/ He is a saint that Puffy." Unlike Lasky, I don't like Coldplay, and I'm not really sold on P. Diddy, but it doesn't matter. The point is that things are. P. Diddy exists, and that's giving me a weird sort of joy right now. Just being is more active and powerful than most people care to imagine, and that's why Lasky's "black life" isn't something beyond and deeper than everyday life; it is the depth and beyond-ness that already exist in it.

It would probably be a crime to review Black Life and not say something about the poem "I Hate Irony." It is a really good poem, but I don't think you can really get it's full breadth without being immersed in the collection. That's one of the reasons aesthetic criticism is a crime, jewel thievery, taking only the things that glitter out of the poet's dark mud, but here it is anyway:

DOROTHEA LASKY

I HATE IRONY

I was walking along one day when I realized that I hate irony

I think I was thinking of the movie The Shining and how scary it is

When I was 21 I didn't sleep for two nights straight because of that movie

It reminded me a lot of growing up and the things I've seen

Fear is not irony

If you have ever been truly scared there is no irony in your voice when you scream

And too

Love is not either

I was in love once and all I could think of was joy

Not drinking, nor sex, or spaghetti

Not witty things to say or martinis

That bubble down the stairs with gracious olives

I didn't think of my large grey turtleneck folding over my abdomen

As I was touched so quietly by the stars

I hate when people think they are being funny by being ironic

Or they want to show you they are clever

So they say something really meaty

With twists and curves

I don't think it is funny to be so elitist

To everyone who hasn't had the chance to be as special as you are

Being cultivated into fine things when you yourself was nothing to begin with

Humor is not irony as I belly laugh along the bench

Of the waiting room while they announce my father will die

Or when my friend was killed by her husband while he wore all black

To be torched is not ironic, but it hurts

It hurt her flesh. It hurts me to think about it.

And not precious I am to think about it, to give it time

Oh but Dottie, you say, you are so funny

Surely you realize you are always being ironic

But I am not, I will tell you

I am only being real

To me, this poem is about a tone that is beyond irony or sincerity, a tone which is both ironic and sincere at the same time, and so almost totally inscrutable. The effect is that we no longer focus on the question "what is this person saying?" rather, what they say simply is.

I think the poem that comes after "I Hate Irony"—"Poets, You Are Eager"—is really important too. In fact, I think Black Life is filled with important poetry. You should probably buy it.

Buy Black Life here

Buy Awe here