Natch

by Sophia Dahlin

In her first full-length collection, Natch, Sophia Dahlin fashions a dazzling array of queer pastoral lyrics as a means to interrogate the received romantic sublime. By turns funny, passionate, and erotic, the poems of Natch plumb the poet’s deep well of longing and desire, a poetics of queer bodies narrated with a stunningly assured voice, compounded of bravado and vulnerability.

Genres: Poetry, Queer, American

100 pages, Paperback

First published September 21, 2020

Reviews

[Scarllet ✦ iamlitandwit · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm going to have this
here

moment with the moon

in listening
to skimmed off light
of lake

There are a couple of poems out of the many in Natch by Sophia Dahlin that I enjoyed/found enlightening/semi-understood/thought were interesting in their composition and in their erotic imagery... like: Tandem, Ponder The Lily How Does It Go, Switch, I'm a Natural, &Verse Tips To The Soul Like Cows To The Pasture, Anyone Must Sand Gingers, I'm What Now, When Relinquish On A Star, & a couple other poems of hers.. like those are specifically the titles of poems that stood out the most to me. I am going back to read those because the diction, the imagery, the pure connection. They excelled!!

Yet the rest of my time reading this collection was sort of just me reading random words and not getting the picture of it in my mind (this even relates to some of the ones that I liked), not understanding it... though to be fair, poetry doesn't have to be fully understood to be enjoyed (I don't think it needs to be) - tbh, a lot of this for me was nonsensical and very whimsical. Normally that'd be my jam and the sort of thing that I like to read in poetry but it didn't completely work for me.

I looked up Sophia Dahlin on Youtube to see if she had some of her readings online (thankfully, she did! she read most of her collection in a live that was posted & it was helpful since I heard her voice, specifically I heard how she places a focus and attention to the pace of certain words/sentences/structures)

Like I'm still not sure what to think of this collection - in one of the reviews on the back of the book the word "switchy" is used and I do think that there is fracturing and some special kind of "slipperiness" involved that makes this collection unique and confusing and very much something that will have you thinking past the last page.

[a · Rating 4 out of 5]

"escaping acquaintance by desperate means is a pleasure"

[Emily Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

i love these poems. dahlin is so great at running the line between language that is whimsical in its disruption and clear, bright emotional pulls.

[J · Rating 3 out of 5]

For a queer poetry book, nothing in here screams queer. There is love and friendship and allusions to nature and the powerful golden statements, but nothing overtly queer. Because that's what I was expecting, this was a letdown for me. However, I'm sure others would enjoy it! This style just isn't my style.

[Carrie]

Quirky and adorable like Sophia

[Jeimy · Rating 2 out of 5]

These poems are full of vivid, almost visceral imagery. However, in these turbulent times, I am looking for poetry that will soothe my soul, not agitate me because of the poems' imagery.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The legs go hither and thither just blasting
the cunt's wants, like
you and you. You and you.
The cunt wants in twos. Or the legs
fathom binaries better?"

[anon · Rating 5 out of 5]

ugh chef's kiss a lesbian dreamworld my heart

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Someday my punishment will come
like a hamburger skidding down
a zinc countertop.

How still we’ll be
me lollipopped on my paunchy stool
some bun stacked red with the glam of death
what was made for me is mine.
—from “I’m a Ninny”

Natch is Dahlin’s first book-length collection of poems—accessible, personal, and exuberant in their enjoyment of the body, alone and coupled. She has a knack for aphorisms, too: “the rain nips patrons from the sidewalk in” to a café, and “I can’t buy freedom / but I can denude my wishlist,” and “People couple to suffer.” I look forward to this poet’s future.