O’Hay chronicles life with the drunks, junkies and gamblers. A newly married man in New Orleans, sick with the need for...
Poems and photographs that capture life on the street among the down and out, as well as commentary on the decline of nearly everything.
O’Hay chronicles life with the drunks, junkies and gamblers. A newly married man in New Orleans, sick with the need for alcohol, steals a shot of booze at a bar just before “the bouncer’s hand on my shoulder / tells me I am paper, tosses me to the curb.” A junkie with a grotesquely swollen leg panhandles near a hotdog stand, asking for $4 for his “prescription.” A street hustler recites the names of the dead “as if lighting candles.” Interspersed with these character sketches and stories are poems about family, as well as poems that showcase the author’s sharp eye and sardonic wit: Preachers at a rest stop don’t realize that the difference between the poet and themselves is that “when they get to Hell / they’ll be surprised.” Alien conquerors will surely decide that the Earth isn’t worth keeping, and should be tossed like “a bruised peach / back on the pile.” One standout poem from the collection is “Inheritor.” It imagines an ancient, wild and undefined thing “pacing” the poet when he was 7 years old, sitting in the back of his grandfather’s car in the “thick shadows that skirt the tree line.” O’Hay’s work is gritty, keen and sympathetic without being condescending. Some of his imagery is especially striking—a pair of cardinals fight on his lawn “like two blood stains / in love with the same / bullet”—made all the more so by his clear, straightforward language throughout. The book includes black-and-white photographs of Philadelphia’s homeless taken by the author, and a portion of the book’s proceeds goes to a nonprofit that services Philly’s homeless community.Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2011
ISBN: 978-1466362741
Page Count: 132
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: June 25, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An ambitious collection—which asks the world to stop its destructive ways and recognize the importance of Africans—that...
A narrator rails against racism and ignorance in this debut poetry volume.
Celly’s book contains hundreds of poems, most of them quite short, that describe a man who is living in a universe full of unenlightened individuals who cause destruction because of their lack of knowledge. In particular, they do not appreciate the contributions of people of African descent and confound the narrator with their bigotry, murderous ways, and inability to become edified. Nevertheless, he is self-assured and encourages others to follow him. “I am the maestro without the orchestra,” he writes in the volume’s opening poem, “A Maestro,” but notes that humans won’t have the privilege of discerning what’s in his mind “until they stop killing each other.” As the many poems in the volume progress, he begins to refer to himself as “The Negus,” an African emperor or king. He has the “noble blood of the Kongo Kingdom” in “Legendary Blood,” descended from warriors, geniuses, and visionaries. The tone of the poems overall seeks to be high-minded, with references to The Prince by Machiavelli and the French Revolution. There is also a call to emulate African rhythms, such as the Congolese rumba or the songs of Bob Marley, in “It Must Rhyme and Flow.” A mysterious “they” is often mentioned, though it is unclear if this is a reference to Western society, racists, or uneducated people. Yet the narrator, who has a commanding presence, does describe an overall war on Africa and encourages Africans to rise up. Moreover, he transcends race and the color barrier and desires something mystical. “I am not a Negro. I am renegade. I am the Negus straight from heaven,” he writes in “Defined by Color Only Not So Fast!” Celly’s expansive volume, which aspires to thoughtful and strong lines about humanity and its failings, is not hostile but uses grandiose language to ponder and decree. While there are hundreds of poems, many are quite vague and are just one line or a short paragraph. The work is not entirely an exercise in self-aggrandizement, but the collection’s message can get lost amid the numerous ambiguities and repeated proclamations.
An ambitious collection—which asks the world to stop its destructive ways and recognize the importance of Africans—that remains hampered by nebulous and unspecified pronouncements.Pub Date: July 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-68319-824-6
Page Count: 262
Publisher: Tate Publishing
Review Posted Online: Aug. 25, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An often gripping work with an engaging protagonist.
In Leatherman’s (Vanity Insanity, 2014) novel, an Omaha, Nebraska, high school teacher uncovers danger on campus as she grapples with challenges in her personal life.
Reeling from her ex-husband’s remarriage, Annie Day is distressed by the idea that her American dream has been tarnished. As the single parent of a son, Oliver, she certainly has her hands full. But when human bones are discovered on the high school campus where she teaches American literature, she faces a new set of worries. While police work to establish whose bones they are, she starts receiving strange, upsetting notes, including one that simply reads, “BE CAREFUL.” She finds refuge in her classroom, supporting her students by working with them after school, preparing them for college entrance exams, and helping them to relate class materials to their own lives. The mystery of the bones ultimately links to disturbing criminal activity at the high school. Readers will root for Annie and enjoy her inner dialogue, which features her disdain for poor grammar and her fondness for murder-mystery TV shows, especially Dateline. At points, though, the main story drifts. The novel features several side plots, such as Annie’s search for a ghost that she encountered on vacation and her attempt to deliver a letter she finds in the attic, revealing a shocking family secret of the house’s previous owners. Additionally, there are several chapters from the perspective of Annie’s cowboy relatives in the 1930s, relating a saga that’s intriguing enough to have been its own novel; however, they don’t directly enhance Annie’s story, which is strong enough without them. Leatherman’s prose is often excellent, as in a humorous, memorable scene during parent-teacher conference day, when a hungry Annie mentally compares parents’ personalities to snacks: an overbearing couple is undercooked dough, a saucy mother is a sour cherry ball, a sweet grandmother is cinnamon toast. The author tackles the main mystery plot with poignancy at the end of the story, but more in-depth exploration throughout would have been interesting.
An often gripping work with an engaging protagonist.Pub Date: Dec. 16, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5376-5901-5
Page Count: 436
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 8, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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