I Wrote This for You

Can’t wait to see if there are more books by this author!

It strikes me that for almost all of these pages that the term 'poem' is wholly incorrect. None of these pages, despite their titles or formatting, feel like poems, but could be much more accurately labeled aphorisms. One of the only pages that can arguably actually be referred to as a poem is "The Fragments Belong Together", and even that is almost exclusively because of formatting choices rather than language choices. I think they would be better-called aphorisms with accompanying artistic visual elements. Each of these pages contains a witty and concise observation or well-developed thought. While incredibly short poems have often existed in poetry, these thoughts are so concise that poetic conventions cannot even be applied to the sentences. Each of these pages, despite their crafted thoughts, lacks the intentionality and choice found in poetry. They lack intentionality to the point that some of them, like "The Water Is On Fire", even have blatant grammar and punctuation errors. And you asked why people always expected you to smile in photographs. And I told you it was because they hoped that in the future, there would be something to smile about. ("The Corners Of Your Mouth", 7) A major aspect of this book is the page size, often full color, photographs that accompany every single page of poems. Every poem is accompanied by a photograph. I enjoy many of these photographs, but ultimately I think their inclusion in the collection only serves to diminish the poem's value rather than enhance it. Because every poem is accompanied by a photograph many of the photographs and poems feel like they have been randomly paired together rather than paired to enhance each other. In the end, having photographs and poems that aren't suited to each other weakens the message of both. Along the same vein, another complaint about the collection is how the titles pair with both the poems and photographs. Specifically, that they often don't. In a few cases, the title clearly correlates to the poem, in a few more the title makes sense paired with the photograph. Notably, nowhere in the collection does the title seem to accompany both the poem and the photograph. The only time I think all three make sense together is on page 63 with "The Humans Aren't Recyclable". I would say through a vast majority of this collection that all on the same page the title, photograph, and poem all seem like entirely separate unrelated elements. This is especially frustrating to me because I see so much potential value in adding visual elements to traditional poems, but in this case, it just doesn't work. Despite my general ambivalence, leaning towards dislike, of the collection as a whole there are a couple of killer lines in this. Some of these 'poems' are delightfully articulated observations of the world that just resonate. I would perhaps call them more philosophy than poetic, but they still feel and do good, which is worth celebrating. The absolute best poem of this collection is "The Fur" which is Iain's poem that often gets misattributed to Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. "Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let the pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place." (3) Given that I was already intimately familiar with the poem I now attribute 'best of the collection' means that overall, I am a bit disappointed with what I found in the collection. Of the 186 'poems' in this collection the only ones I found notable are; "The Way Glass Breaks", "The Fragile Arc", "The Lovers Bleed Into Each Other", "The Things That Are Left", "The Forgotten Star", "The Leftovers" and "The End Of That", "The Sheer Arrogance Of Loneliness", "The Cupboard Is Empty", "The Error Of Parallax", "The Things Sold By The Sea Shore", "The Slipstream We're Caught In", "The Few And Fewer", "The Dwindling Conversation" which was a highlight for