Conventional Weapons

by Tracey Slaughter

Conventional Weapons is lyrical and dirty, sexy and dark—it is cul-de-sac life, viewed through a grimy ranch slider. These poems closely observe the beauty and depravity of human nature, revealing lives that are hard-bitten and sometimes tragic, but in Tracey Slaughter’s hands, they become radiant.

Genres: Poetry

96 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2020

Reviews

[Marcus Hobson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collections by Tracey Slaughter is the first of her poetry that I have read. I have two collections of her short stories, including Deleted Scenes for Lovers. I would characterise her stories as raw, realistic and often with a sense of being on the wrong side of the tracks. The run down side of town, or the well-worn back seat of a very old car.

These poems have a similar feel. A bit rough and a bit raw. Not always somewhere you want to drop in for a cup of tea, or find yourself after dark. There is a good deal of sex too. In fact, I did a little check, of the nineteen poems in the collection, seventeen have sexual references. One of the two that don’t, one just has a bit of kissing so I didn’t count it. The location of the sex is partially reflected in a number of other frequent references; six to hotels or motels, eight to cars, and six to pubs. There are quite a few references to domestic violence and to vinyl, either car seats or bar stools rather than records. Lace, silk or satin also pops up on ten occasions. Why am I counting these things? Well I suppose I was looking for themes and then for references.

One of the standouts features of this collection is that you are not always clear on the meaning, you have to think and reflect a little on what is happening and what it means. I think that is a good thing. Too often meaning is spelt out for us and we don’t have to engage our reader’s brain too much. I like to have to think and reflect and read again, until I reach a deeper and more fulfilling meaning.

There are some great lines, which stuck in my mind. Talking about the metal stairwell of the fire escape at the back of a building:
‘stunted couples
badmouthing each other
up the echo
chamber of welded
tread

one man giving
his wide a countdown
to get her ragged
arse back’

I mentioned those hints of domestic violence, and this is a good example:
‘I still walk
into every door, looking
for love. It’s too late
when you hear to swing
coming.’

Three of the last four poems in the collection have the trifecta of sex, hotels and lace (or satin). I marked these out as being about adultery too, not just sex. These are also my favourites. In ‘breather’ I found the wonderful line ‘Just slip off the lace of thinking twice.’ The well-spaced first page contrasts sharply with the second, which is a solid block of tightly packed sentences each starting with the words ‘Call your wife…’. In the middle a couple are crushing lines: ‘Call your wife, leave a message at the sob.’ and ‘Call your wife, she remembers the colour of the wallpaper in neonatal.’ The page ends with a final line that breaks the trend. ‘Fuck me hard, then call your wife.’ It is a page of prose to make any adulterous husband stop in his tracks, and is why that contrast with slipping of the lace of thinking twice works so beautifully.

In the final poem of the book called ‘tryst’ we are back in another seedy hotel room, but this time there are some other great lines:
‘I’ve put on satin that’s made for
depravity

& my eyelids are
coloured like bait,…’


I love the rawness of the encounters and the subjects. I found a piece written by Tracey Slaughter on the Victoria University Press blog from May 2016, where she talks about her own style of writing. I think it is worth quoting in full:
‘A writer’s job is to say the unsayable – it’s a travesty to call yourself a writer and then refuse to face the full range of human experience. Outcries that subjects are too dark, extreme, personal, risky make zero sense to me – those hard realities of life are what writing is for. And every writer know their own ‘black block’, that dark mass under your chest wall that holds your deep material, the stories you must speak of. If you don’t listen to that, your stories might stay clean, but the page will, in effect, be empty.’

[Simon Sweetman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best books of poems I've read in ages. Gut-punch stuff. So very good. A must.