Book Review: Teeth by Aracelis Girmay - Page 2

While the opening poem is about war directly, there is much else in this collection that is dark, about discrimination, despair and death. Particularly powerful and disturbing is "Sudan," a poem about rape in Darfur. It paraphrases a line from the Darfur Testimonies: "You are black, woman,/ & you are/ our slave."  She connects it to similar atrocities committed much closer to home — "Or, it is not Kornei, & it is not Sudan, & her/ children are not in a field, but in the next room,/ waiting." There are also poems referencing inequality in America, both past and present.

Not everything in this collection is dark and depressing, however. The poems I enjoyed most in this collection are, on the surface, about food. "Ode to the Watermelon" is a celebration of enduring symbols and pleasures despite oppression and slaughter. In Palestine, where it is forbidden to fly their own flag, the watermelon with its red and green and black is raised in its stead. There is beautiful language in this poem — ripe, playful, sexy.

The watermelon is a "Ripe conjugationer of water & sun... bandera of the ground,/ language of fields," a symbol of hope, wafting its scent even under the blade. Addressing the watermelon directly,

Men bow their heads, open-mouthed,
to coax the sugar
from beneath your workdress.
Women lift you
to their teeth

And most hopeful,

yours is a sweetness
to outlast any slaughter:
Tongues will lose themselves inside you,
scattering seeds. All over,
the land will hum
with your wild,
raucous blooming.

(Listen to Girmay read from this poem) 

Also celebratory and rich with meaning, and also about food, is "Scent: Love Poem for the Pilon." Food is used wonderfully here in both it's literal and metaphoric senses. The narrator is thankful for the Mercado, for chopped onions, oregano, salt, cloves, red beans, black beans, and rice. She is "thankful for the kitchen table:/ block of wood, & nails,/ & the carpenter's hand," thankful for the pepper grinder, "the clean smell of tomatoes & cilantro."

Article Author: Abram Bergen

Abram Bergen is a logophile, thinker, reader, and writer. His research/writing interests include gender and sexuality issues, hybridity and identity politics, secular ethics, and ecosensitive technologies and lifestyles. …

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