ReviewStack: McAllister's Mates Fourteen

Hi all

Two interesting pieces that both take on poetry’s most ubiquitous but inexhaustible subject - the Night’s Sky. What really piqued my interest is that they both run against my own instincts on the matter - I do like to be challenged.

These reviews are part of Reviewstack run by the great writer and pillar of the Substack Community : Thaddeus Thomas

An ongoing series of reviews of some of the wonderful articles, poems, and stories I’ve discovered on Substack (and other places) and more importantly the beautiful souls behind the works.

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Hazel

Night poetry (especially when set in the city) tends to reveal in spectacle - neon lights, the lure of dancing, and of course the star filled sky. This is a sombre piece where our character rejects those transitory distractions. The night landscape is sketched in a minimalist almost dismissive way. Cars and trucks are mere obstacles, both physical and mental - visual and perhaps audible attacks on a longed for moment of reverie. In a particularly clever play on words our protagonist is “Ridden with conflict, chained by little bars”. Again a comment on the garish noise and lights coming from drinking establishments, or some sort of internal struggle against a barrier to insight? Perhaps both, the aggressive celebrations of nighttime revellers dampening a moment of blissful solitude. The author senses rather than sees the cityscape, dismissing the opportunities on offer. This might sound melancholic, perhaps even solipsistic but this is no exercise in self pity, rather it’s a very different sort of adventure.

In some ways the poem reminds me of Sylvia Plath’s quote “I need a father. I need a mother. I need some older, wiser being to cry to. I talk to God, but the sky is empty.” This poem however takes the idea a lot further. This is a poem about the vast empire of the multi-faceted self. Plath was indeed a genius author, however, I do find that quote a little defeatist, if we can’t find the solution, or even a succinct definition of the problem without - it is both valid, and indeed courageous to look within. Sometimes those moments of doubt and longing act as an invitation to find the archetypal spirit of Mother and Father within our own souls (or psyches if you prefer).

The poem ends in a moment of quiet victory, finding a clear space both mental and physical under the moonlight, above the chattering mind. Now a very different journey is about to commence. One that starts with humility but carries a determination to become something greater. Like the best poems this one ends on a hook - we don’t get to share the protagonist's meditations and subsequent revelations. This is to the good, now we (the readers) are forced to look inwards- to leave the “monochrome streets” of our own immediate environment. Many wonderful and perhaps dangerous things await, I’d wager they’re anything but dull and monochrome.

Poem: Under the Moonlight

Bence Ádók

This is a gorgeous piece of work with a difficult message at its heart. While that might sound contradictory it isn't. The dangerous ideas hiding within the honeyed words draw the reader in. The lyrics then hammer home their message of chasing ideas at the expense of real experience. I've previously speculated that perhaps most of a poem's experience comes from cadence and imagery, with narrative running secondary. For me, good poetry often raises adjectives over nouns and this is a masterclass in the art.

Returning to the dangerous ideas I mentioned, this is a sharp criticism of the poet’s mindset. Their florid words are turned into a deconstructive scalpel to expose any conceit and neuroticism hiding within the lyrics. As a metaphysical poet myself, it's a bit like being slapped in the face by a velvet glove. “Know that the poets transfixed and crucified to the showboat of the stars have all fallen” - roses cut deeper than nettles! However, Benece is himself a poet and a good one. This is not a “trashing of the art”, rather I see this as a call for poets to balance both themselves and their work. We use the stars as pins for our hopes and wishes. We make them dots to join sketched lines of heroes, monsters, and human fantasies. What of their true power; disciplined infernos balancing raging nuclear energies? Giants of burning gases forming worlds, maybe even supporting lifeforms millions of miles from us.

I see a warning in these lyrics showing the dangers of anthropomorphising every grain of sand? Writers often dig into every facet of the natural world for some poetic or esoteric truth. Maybe nature isn't the least bit interested in creating a framework for our internal dramas. Can we break free of the imprisoning stars with the simple realisation that we shaped their brilliance into prison bars without so much as a by your leave? Maybe we can shape our odes around the beautiful truths of science rather than the dim mists of legend. Why not have our cake and eat it? The pinning ode to the heavens can become a conversation - yes we can speak of Orion’s belt but knowing that the spirit of Orion is within our psyches. Does the poem encourage us to speak our yearnings to the stars, not as superstitious peasants, but as active observers of consciousness? Am I projecting? Why not, I’m not sure the poem is a warning against ALL projection, maybe just the unconscious and utterly fanciful. We can “see” the night’s beautiful theatre but we can truly interrogate these imaginings. The seeds of the solutions to real world problems can be found in such soil. The poem ends with “A new day yet and the sun also rises, but for what?”. I see this as a challenge to find a dragon in that sun but know that he is MY dragon - not to be solely attributed to our star, certainly not to be foisted on the world as dogma, but a dragon to ride through my story.

A Star Is A Prison

I hope you enjoy these beautiful works as much as I enjoyed reading them and writing about them.

You can meet some of my other friends in the previous instalments: 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Substack has proven to be a treasure trove and I already have a few more gifted writers lined up for my next review newsletter.