Philip Kobylarz, Go West Young (Insert Gender Here), Photograph
READING AFTER EIGHTY
Who is Seth? I thought he was the father of Sonia. But now it seems he is her brother. Or is that Sam who sells drugs and lures young kids. And what about grandma who chants spells and slips amulets under Sara’s pillow. Whose granny is she? Or is she the family maid who seduced Sawyer. No idea if Sawyer is boy or a girl. Maybe two spirited. Maybe she/he/they are the one(s) who stole Shane’s bicycle. Who cares. And then there’s Sylvie, the estranged stepmother or second cousin, drinking up men at two am. What’s with all the “S” names? Already 20 by page 12. I am starting a spread sheet. Or would if I knew how. I did once. I made financial spreadsheets on Lotus. The wunderkind of a company that made bamboo socks. I am only on page 30 and I can’t figure out if this is a fantasy or a murder mystery. Perhaps a parable. Or maybe a comedy, although nothing seems funny to me. The book is too heavy. My hands hurt. Only 786 pages to go. No appendices. No pictures. My grandson’s books all have pictures. I nod off. Tomorrow I will start over for the tenth time. Try to get past page 35. Or maybe I will read Frog and Toad Are Friends.
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Claire Scott
Review by Zeke Sanchez
My first reaction to “Reading After Eighty” was to be intrigued. It felt like I was reading T.S. Eliot or James Joyce. I say this because there was a torrent of information and/or names. A surfeit of relationships, too. So I was drawn in. It’s a somewhat unconventional poem it that it reads somewhat like prose. Not even much of a rhythm or roll, as they say. But it had content, and within all the apparent confusion and questions of the speaker, who is purportedly eighty or older, there was an expectation that in the search for answers would also become apparent some answers about her life, and something about OUR lives.
I don’t want to forget the humor in the poem. The humor in comparing her struggles to follow the thread of the book she’s reading with the memory of once constructing financial Lotus spreadsheets. She was the wunderkind of a company that made bamboo socks, imagine that!