Laurie Doctor, Come Further In, Oil and Mixed Media on Wood, 13″ X 24″
Not to Half-Ass It
The demands of not | half-assing this one
thing are more | stringent than simply
half-assing 99% of all | the other things The price
tag not to half- | ass it is near
unbearable The price tag | not to half-ass it
is objectively | unreasonable What's
a “reasonable” demand | to ask of oneself? When you
compare the amount | to other amounts
When you make a mortal | ratio of numbers
The economics | are not on a
human scale The extremity | of it means in a way
we've reached | the terminal point
of a perception of how | things are supposed to
play out The | disowned theory
of mimicry Drive to efface | the distinction between
self and | environment “Instinct
of renunciation” Because if | you were “smart” the
whole way | being shuttled
along this tunnel being | crammed down this
excruciating tunnel | you were looking
for a janitorial doorway | leading elsewhere leading
to a room | with a party piñata
and people half-assing | the beating down of some
representational animal | stubbornly
metaphorical animal | to achieve a low-quality
leak of generic | drugstore candy—
_________________
Oni Buchanan
Review by Dennis Hinrichsen
“Not to Half-Ass It” is a much more fractured ride than the previous poem. I enjoy where it ends up—I think the poem finds its formal groove in these last five couplets. However, I’m not quite sure how to read—rather hear—how the opening movements are hanging together. I am a big fan of finding new ways to punctuate and guide the reader’s eye and ear, but I need more help on this one to understand how the formal gesture of half-assing the poem with half-lines and graphic punctuation is working with syntax and content. Not sure yet what is gained by this. But I’m intrigued. Perhaps I need to John Cage this one and prepare my ear (and eye and mind) differently. Will work on that.