Torched Verse Ends

Steven D. Schroeder

2009

Roy Wang

Steven Schroeder and his brain like to wander. Whether physically through the landscapes of Colorado, or mentally through recollections of schadenfreude, Schroeder drags his rucksack of modern references behind him. String theory, Asimov, army-town life, thermodynamics – all pop up naturally in the course of his bizarre musings.

But what exactly is he trying to get through? The most telling page of the book is the “Index of Selected Subject Matter” where he lists the pages that reference alcohol, insomnia, and television. There is no mention of themes, and this is the most direct statement of the collection’s unity. It’s another small-town isolation of a bruised, insular kid, using his slightly above-average intelligence to justify his misanthropic judgments. The index, burrowing in minutiae, perfectly sums up the personality the speaker has cultivated throughout, twitching in almost-involuntary directions.

There are three sections to the book, roughly focused on nature, urban scenes, and miscellany related to death and collapse. There isn’t much transition between them in terms of style. The first poems feature no speaker or personality, producing an illusion of seeing his images through a lens transparent as the Colorado air. One standout (“Hayman Wildfire Set by Forest Service Worker”) uses the subjunctive mood to good effect:

That you spotted the fire and the starter
That he drove a gold minivan

…

That replanted ponderosa pine seedlings can feed on satellite feeds for twenty years
That fire started you

There are some neophyte musical moments here, making one hope that Schroeder is being ironic. Alas, he is not, as in “In This Country, Trail Breaks You”: “Rocks jammed in your backpack / launched uphill avalanches / in air so sheer and sharpened / it hyperventilated // your ice-carved lungs.”

The second section introduces a speaker more presently, but the personality is still elusive. Plenty of sarcasm, but it’s a mistake to confuse that with character. Still, with titles such as, “Sweet Mother of Crap, What Did the Bookcase Ever Do to You?” and “I’ve Been Told to Correct My Passive Voice” we get some more traction. We also get some cognitive echoes showing some artistry: a billiard table pocket’s open mouth showing surprise or hinting that eating carne asada daily is like eating shit in life.

It’s also funny when he wants it to be. Consider this from “Pick Your Punchline”: “Yesterday, the umpteenth woman ran out crying after a date with me. // She acted like she’d never seen a pair of night vision goggles before.”

The final section has some science fiction apocalyptic flourishes, including a poem that looks like some basic computer code. Interesting, but like the last line, “Go to zero. Do not divide by zero. Error error error” (“Robot Rhetoric”), we ultimately don’t know what to make of this book, and unfortunately, we don’t care.

We do go out with a good one in “Prayer to a Higher Horsepower,” which highlights while we may not know where we’re going, we’re sure going to try and get there fast:

Vehicle of the Second Law
and Car of Infinite Cylinders, lay waste
the energy of this engine,
the change beneath our seats,
the road eroding under that–
and stall all that matters
to uniform zero RPM.