{"id":228,"date":"2014-07-06T23:14:20","date_gmt":"2014-07-07T03:14:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/?p=228"},"modified":"2014-07-06T23:14:20","modified_gmt":"2014-07-07T03:14:20","slug":"review-of-biting-the-apple-by-jeanie-greensfelder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/?p=228","title":{"rendered":"Review of Biting the Apple by Jeanie Greensfelder"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Greensfelder<\/a><\/p>\n

Jeanie Greensfelder. Biting the Apple. <\/em>Penciled In, 2012. 58 pgs. $12.50.<\/p>\n

Reviewed by Lynn Domina<\/p>\n

Biting the Apple, <\/em>Jeanie Greensfelder\u2019s first collection of poetry (and the inaugural publication of Penciled In press), consists of short lyrics that aim to convey the speaker\u2019s fall into knowledge. Many of these poems focus on specific encounters\u2014with the self, with others, with the world\u2014that contribute to the speaker\u2019s self-understanding, the type of memories that rise again and again, demanding comprehension. They trace the speaker\u2019s development from bewildered (and eventually disobedient) child through adolescence and early adulthood to the moment she finds herself in the near present, a woman approaching the status of elderly, if not quite there yet, the grateful companion of other children.<\/p>\n

The book\u2019s title is, of course, an allusion to the forbidden fruit, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the story of Adam and Eve\u2019s disobedience and expulsion from Eden. Apples appear in several of the poems, but the one most directly linked to the theme of Biting the Apple<\/em> occurs second in the collection. \u201cThe Bad Apple\u201d describes the speaker\u2019s father\u2019s purchase of a whole bushel, enough for an entire season. Rather than celebrate abundance, though, the father insists that the speaker eat only bruised apples, perhaps to save the whole batch from spoiling, but the effect is a suggestion of stinginess. The bushel paradoxically creates an atmosphere of scarcity. Finally, alone in the house, the speaker sneaks to the basement and chooses \u201ca perfect apple.\u201d Then, \u201cUpstairs I cut it crosswise \/ and eat around the stars. \/ I do not fall \/ into Snow White slumber. \/\/ When my father comes home, \/ I smile in innocence \/ and he smiles back, \/ unaware of my new friend \/ the serpent.\u201d The most compelling image here is \u201ceat around the stars,\u201d for it is both precise and surprising. Although most readers will anticipate the speaker\u2019s disobedience (for what child, given the chance, would not have disobeyed this father\u2019s instructions?), readers will nevertheless sympathize with the child\u2019s new knowledge at the poem\u2019s conclusion, that disobedience doesn\u2019t always lead to the dire consequences predicted by the book of Genesis.<\/p>\n

The most effective poem in the collection, and one which represents Greensfelder\u2019s style at its best, is \u201cSixth Grade,\u201d recently selected by Ted Kooser for his American Life in Poetry column. The syntax here is straightforward, the vocabulary simple and direct. Yet there is a terror at the heart of this poem, but Greensfelder wisely conveys it through metaphor. Each of the first two stanzas consists of a single sentence, composed without symbol or figurative language: \u201cWe didn\u2019t like each other, \/ but Lynn\u2019s mother had died, \/ and my father had died. \/\/ Lynn\u2019s father didn\u2019t know how to talk to her, \/ my mother didn\u2019t know how to talk to me, \/ and Lynn and I didn\u2019t know how to talk to each other.\u201d So the two don\u2019t talk; instead, they create a game: \u201cA secret game drew us close: \/ we took turns being the prisoner, \/ who stood, hands held behind her back, \/\/ while the captor, using an imaginary bow, \/ shot arrow after arrow after arrow \/ into the prisoner\u2019s heart.\u201d These final two stanzas acquire their power from the imagery, the straightforward language and syntax, and also from Greensfelder\u2019s choice simply to dramatize the game, concluding the poem without a gesture toward explanation.<\/p>\n

Occasionally the poems do explain a bit too much for my taste. For example, in \u201cThe Bad Apple\u201d quoted above, the phrase \u201cin innocence\u201d could be cut, a deletion that would intensify the poem\u2019s complexity, I think, without creating any confusion for the reader. In some of the poems, the language could be tighter, becoming more memorable through compression. \u201cKnitting\u201d begins with this stanza: \u201cI hold out my arms. Mother \/ puts coils of yarn around them. \/ Starting with a thread, \/ she winds ball after ball, \/ colors for her afghan.\u201d If the second line read, \u201ccoils yarn around them,\u201d would anything be lost? I don\u2019t think so, and then the most interesting word in the line, \u201ccoils,\u201d would both acquire the significant position of first word in the line and also function as the verb, enhancing its imagistic power. On the other hand, the first line is remarkable for its enjambment. How much more effective it is to break the line after \u201cMother\u201d than it would have been to simply follow the grammar of the sentence\u2014many poets would have begun this stanza, \u201cI hold out my arms. \/ Mother puts coils of yarn\u2026\u201d Greensfelder\u2019s choice illustrates the significant difference poets can create by attending to the structure of the line as well as the grammar of the sentence. We see the child holding out her arms to Mother here, although the sentences suggest a separation between the child\u2019s gesture and the mother\u2019s action.<\/p>\n

Greensfelder\u2019s poems challenge us to consider the contributions of ordinary speech to literary language, a discussion that has been ongoing for at least forty years and is likely to continue as contemporary writers infuse their work with allusions to pop culture and classical culture simultaneously. This discussion actually begins with a consideration of audience and then leads to debates about accessibility or exclusivity, a debate I do not care to enter into here. Greensfelder achieves accessibility, and Biting the Apple <\/em>would be a good collection to hand to any person who claims not to be able to understand contemporary poetry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jeanie Greensfelder. Biting the Apple. Penciled In, 2012. 58 pgs. $12.50. Reviewed by Lynn Domina Biting the Apple, Jeanie Greensfelder\u2019s first collection of poetry (and the inaugural publication of Penciled In press), consists of short lyrics that aim to convey the speaker\u2019s fall into knowledge. Many of these poems focus on specific encounters\u2014with the self, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-areviewaweek"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=228"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":230,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228\/revisions\/230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}