The Lines Are Not My Friends
Poems by
Stacia M. Fleegal
Cervena Barva
W. Somerville MA 02144
Copyright © 2010 by Stacia M. Fleegal
28 pages, softbound
Review by Zvi A. Sesling
Cervena Barva Press, headed by poet Gloria Mindock has a habit of
publishing talented poets and writers whose work is exciting to read
if not provocative. Stacia M. Fleegal’s latest entry in the poetry oeuvre
is like a crossover SUV – both exciting and provocative. It is enjoyable
while making the reader think.
Ms. Fleegal has takes on people and life that one does not always see
from glassblowers to revolutionaries, the latter carrying allusions to
John Wayne, the Three Little Pigs, perhaps a touch of Dylan Thomas,
but you have to think and imagine to see these and that is what makes
some of the poems a joy.
In one poem Fleegal defends anger in the opening lines of In Defense of Anger:
america is the quietest land of all the lands. Our billboards
say yes for us, no to the opposite of what’s on them.
later she provides these lines:
They lost your number when they switched to Verizon.
You turned around and painted it in the sky, and not in blue,
These are lines many a poet would have liked to pen, and so
are the opening lines of In Defense of Antagonizing People:
In football, the tip of the nose tackle’s nose
is the starting point of a metaphor
about peace. Yes, the good game ass-slap
always involves taking sides.
Ah the imagery, picture Vince Wilfork, the New England Patriots’
nose take as a metaphor about peace! Or even better, slapping
a 315 pound man’s butt!
Then there are some other poems which are right up there for
seriousness, sarcasm and some feminist humor as in Elegy for
Hillary’s Campaign, June 4, 2008.
But my personal favorite in this tidy little volume is The Call, in
which Fleegal, trying to call God (with a capital G), encounters
the frustration of dealing with automated phone answering systems.
For those who enjoy poetry with wry humor, different takes and
serious thoughts, this is a collection for you.
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