Draw a little bird by Mary Ann Samyn
Reading Mary Ann Samyn's poetry has been particularly interesting for me because I am currently in the Engl418 seminar with her. The class covers fiction, non-fiction, and poetry, and while she is clearly well versed in all three, her forte is poetry and I am glad to be able to read some of her work. "Draw a little bird" especially jumped out at me. Reading it, I get the impression that the speaker is a bit older, reminiscing about 1979, when apparently the girls felt the pressure to impress so they brightened their cheeks with lipstick. But time has passed and the speaker, who so enjoyed her youth and seemingly standard life, feels that she has little to offer - only enough to fill one volume, and a small one at that. At the same time, she finds her simple life inspiring and wants to share it - for any price. Maybe I read it too simply, but I enjoyed it. Especially the line "Yes, I accept personal checks, word-of-mouth, token love." The speaker will share her knowledge with anyone willing to listen. "Blotched and botched" is also a pleasing line to the ear, although it makes me feel sympathy for the speaker. I find it interesting that of the two poems by Samyn in the packet, both end with "-" as if the speaker as been cut off in the middle of her sentence. I'm not sure if it's supposed to sound abrupt when read out loud or just look as though the speaker lost her voice unexpectedly, but I like the effect - it definitely makes me curious about what else there might be to the poem.
~Nicole Bartow
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Nicole,
ReplyDeleteI think it's so neat that you have Mary Ann Samryn for class! Her class sounds very interesting and it is obvious by reading her poem that she is a great writer. I think her poem "Draw a little bird" is creative and complex. I especially like the title of it; it creates such a unique image for the reader. I also like how the poem looks on the page. The title is a much bigger font without overpowering the page, and the poem looks almost like a small box. It's visual appealing to look at. I like how the lines in the poem are so short. For example, "1979. Make-believe." Though the lines are short, they are not seperated by line breaks, which makes the poem more fluid. It's a nice techniuqe.
My favorite line in the poem is "Yes, I accept personal checks, word-of-mouth, token love." What an interesting line! I like how the author pairs "personal checks" in this line. Perhaps she is poking fun at the concept because so many store no longer accept checks? Whatever the case, it makes for a great line and concept. I also like how the author uses "sir" in the poem. It is a reference that she wrote the poem wanting to reach out to someone and get a point across. It's very interesting.
Overall, I agree that the speaker of the poem may be a bit older and that the poem is the speaker reminiscing about her more youthful days. The clue that the poem is written by an older speaker is that the year "1979" is written in the poem. "Draw a little bird" may not actual mean what it says, instead, maybe it is referring to the days when the author wore lots of make-up. I am still unsure how to interprete the last line of the poem, though I liked how it sounds and ends with a dash. It makes it seem as though the poem could keep going.
Katy Haines