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laura_sackton 's review for:
Villainy
by Andrea Abi-Karam
This is wild punk anarchist poetry, most of it is in all caps. I read it in a sitting and it didn't leave me with much. It's a book about fucking up the system and not being who the system wants you to be. It's about declaring yourself outside, about revolutionary radical love outside of colonialism, about fucking shit up and being angry and using that anger to ignite the world. It’s about the kind of care that folks can give each other. A raging song about a radical future. I'm here for this, though the poetry itself, the lines, the words, the form, didn't work so well for me.
I think there’s a lot in it that I missed, and I think there’s a lot in it that is interesting and beautiful. I wonder sometimes if I’m closing myself off to certain kinds of poetry. This is an interesting question to ponder as I write more poetry, as I think about the kinds of poetry I love. I don’t want to stay inside the lines. I don’t want to expect something from poetry books. So it’s interesting for me to think about the times and spaces where I can open up and expand my brain and think, okay, what is this book doing that I’m not seeing? Why is it not making me feel anything? Could I read it differently to find feeling in it, and if not, who is the feeling here for? I'm looking for ways for poetry to make me feel bigger and stranger even when I’m not in love with it.
I think there’s a lot in it that I missed, and I think there’s a lot in it that is interesting and beautiful. I wonder sometimes if I’m closing myself off to certain kinds of poetry. This is an interesting question to ponder as I write more poetry, as I think about the kinds of poetry I love. I don’t want to stay inside the lines. I don’t want to expect something from poetry books. So it’s interesting for me to think about the times and spaces where I can open up and expand my brain and think, okay, what is this book doing that I’m not seeing? Why is it not making me feel anything? Could I read it differently to find feeling in it, and if not, who is the feeling here for? I'm looking for ways for poetry to make me feel bigger and stranger even when I’m not in love with it.