Ally’s Reviews > The Narrow Road to the Interior: Poems > Status Update
Ally
is on page 76 of 109
How to defend ourselves and _not_ plunge into war? Would silence or inaction be a defense of, say--stoning women? [...] Of executing adulteresses, amputating a thief's hand, denying a girl's education, denying a woman's medical care?
[it is wild to watch the paroxysms of paranoia and propaganda of those weeks ripple through these poems - the sudden shock of islamophobia and jingoism and soulless blind patriotism]
— Jun 02, 2024 08:09AM
[it is wild to watch the paroxysms of paranoia and propaganda of those weeks ripple through these poems - the sudden shock of islamophobia and jingoism and soulless blind patriotism]
Like flag
Ally’s Previous Updates
Ally
is on page 102 of 109
"Conspiring with Shikishi
tanka inspired by Shikishi and her predecessors"
[This form is lovely and totally worth borrowing - the tanka Shikishi is referencing, then Shikishi's tanka, then a sequence of different tanka responses of Hahn's. The multiple responses gives the form some useful looseness; I think a strict three in every set would be too stiff, put too much weight on Hahn's.]
— Jun 04, 2024 07:24PM
tanka inspired by Shikishi and her predecessors"
[This form is lovely and totally worth borrowing - the tanka Shikishi is referencing, then Shikishi's tanka, then a sequence of different tanka responses of Hahn's. The multiple responses gives the form some useful looseness; I think a strict three in every set would be too stiff, put too much weight on Hahn's.]
Ally
is on page 82 of 109
"Starting a Zuihitsu on _Eyebrows_ and Discovering _Cocoon_"
[I thought the 9/11 stuff brought me back - but holy smokes the image of pencil-thin eyebrow arches is a time machine]
— Jun 02, 2024 10:42AM
[I thought the 9/11 stuff brought me back - but holy smokes the image of pencil-thin eyebrow arches is a time machine]
Ally
is on page 73 of 109
Once an afternoon for groceries, it is still an afternoon for groceries--and a fear once called _the bridge, the stray suitcase, the rental truck parked too long on the corner._
[9/11 comes out of nowhere in this collection - of course it does, in imitation of a diary. A striking contrast to Shonagon, where the tragedies are deep in the subtext. I both relate to this material more and it seems infinitely distant.]
— Jun 01, 2024 10:00PM
[9/11 comes out of nowhere in this collection - of course it does, in imitation of a diary. A striking contrast to Shonagon, where the tragedies are deep in the subtext. I both relate to this material more and it seems infinitely distant.]
Ally
is on page 71 of 109
Do I know how to slow-dance with a woman? Who would lead?
[sort of wild how this poem criticizes men for weirdly fetishizing queer women while the poet is weirdly fetishizing queer women. maybe this is the point?]
— Jun 01, 2024 08:38PM
[sort of wild how this poem criticizes men for weirdly fetishizing queer women while the poet is weirdly fetishizing queer women. maybe this is the point?]
Ally
is on page 62 of 109
Rolls of waves off Wellfleet. This could be Maui. I could be my mother.
— Jun 01, 2024 08:21PM
Ally
is on page 57 of 109
The diction from a vivisection text is so pure.
(What his best friend told me he said)
_She thinks I found pleasure but I was as present as I was able._
— Jun 01, 2024 08:12PM
(What his best friend told me he said)
_She thinks I found pleasure but I was as present as I was able._
Ally
is on page 51 of 109
It is lovely when a fragment can be a whole. Not just suggest entirety.
(Or can it?)
Where will she cut? And how much is aggressive?
— May 31, 2024 03:11PM
(Or can it?)
Where will she cut? And how much is aggressive?
Ally
is on page 46 of 109
_Shallow of me_ -- only noticing one bird this afternoon. Now I am sure there were sparrows as well. I keep this a secret.
[why am I still such a sucker for bird poems? how to win me: say bird, say hollow, say bone, say the goddesses, say curl, say tender, say crook, say held in the passive and let that be the only passive verb, say alight, say limb or limn or linger or limber, say last and surface as verbs.]
— May 23, 2024 08:14AM
[why am I still such a sucker for bird poems? how to win me: say bird, say hollow, say bone, say the goddesses, say curl, say tender, say crook, say held in the passive and let that be the only passive verb, say alight, say limb or limn or linger or limber, say last and surface as verbs.]
Ally
is on page 38 of 109
The snow was as deep as the startling white, and as her feelings for him.
[Every interpersonal moment in this book is so bad!]
— May 22, 2024 04:22AM
[Every interpersonal moment in this book is so bad!]
Ally
is on page 32 of 109
I could not return to the body that contained only the literal world.
Where *sparrow* does not suggest *sorrow*.
Where *sorrow* does not suggest *sorry*.
("Sparrow")
[I often find myself a little scared of this speaker, how everyone around her is an object, how her wordplay seems to consume emotion and awareness of the world outside her as real, but this ending reverses some of that for me.]
— May 20, 2024 04:02PM
Where *sparrow* does not suggest *sorrow*.
Where *sorrow* does not suggest *sorry*.
("Sparrow")
[I often find myself a little scared of this speaker, how everyone around her is an object, how her wordplay seems to consume emotion and awareness of the world outside her as real, but this ending reverses some of that for me.]
