Here, BulletBrian Turner
For the record, I don’t like the preachy. Are you a preacher? No? Then hush, child. I realize that many people either too dumb or too lazy to form their own opinions may benefit from those screaming masses who proudly wear their beliefs like a badge of honor, but I am not one of those. I can form my own opinions, thank you.
My biggest beef? The bumper sticker. There should be a law which limits their application to one FUNNY sticker only. People who use their cars as their own personal billboards to advertise their myriad beliefs on everything from religion and politics to food and music should be forced to clean every car in a 10-mile radius, just like the gum-chewing child who has to scrape all the desks in his class as punishment. Really: has anyone EVER said, Gee, if it weren’t for that bumper sticker I’d never have changed my ways. Thank goodness for that well placed PETA sticker -- it surely opened my eyes! Consider my conversion complete! I don’t think so. At least I hope not. Dear lord.
My biggest beef? The bumper sticker. There should be a law which limits their application to one FUNNY sticker only. People who use their cars as their own personal billboards to advertise their myriad beliefs on everything from religion and politics to food and music should be forced to clean every car in a 10-mile radius, just like the gum-chewing child who has to scrape all the desks in his class as punishment. Really: has anyone EVER said, Gee, if it weren’t for that bumper sticker I’d never have changed my ways. Thank goodness for that well placed PETA sticker -- it surely opened my eyes! Consider my conversion complete! I don’t think so. At least I hope not. Dear lord.
ok well this one made me giggle
Of course, it is a bit more forgivable for a book to be preachy. When you buy an author’s work, you buy all that he has to give, opinions and all. Still, it’s always best for an author to present the facts, to show the nature of reality objectively and allow the reader to form his own opinion. Thankfully, Brian Turner’s poetry (the second stop on this runaway train that is the Summer Poetry Quest) does just that.
Turner’s Here, Bullet is a collection I’ve been meaning to read since its publication in 2005, when it made a splash due to its subject matter and, if I may be so bold, beauty. Here, Bullet has won several awards since it debuted, beginning with the Beatrice Hawley Award. This collection, however, doesn’t need awards to heighten its visibility; despite the fact that a poetry collection rarely garners major discussion outside of literary circles, the subject matter is important since it describes one soldier’s experiences in Iraq. As a team leader in the US Army, Turner spent a year there and he describes the people, situations, and images on both sides of the cultural and military divide. He avoids taking a clear stand on the war but instead lets his poems speak for themselves, allowing one to form his own conclusions.
I thoroughly enjoyed every poem in the collection – a rarity. I cannot understand why Publishers Weekly panned Turner's poetry when they wrote, “The verse in this book is not good, but it is, in a cultural moment that includes Cindy Sheehan, timely.” Wait, do they mean the poetry is not good? As in bad? Did they read the same Here, Bullet? Although this is no indication of his talent, Turner is educated in his field, having earned an M.F.A. from the University of Oregon, but I maintain, however, that not only is Turner talented, he is able to bring beauty to such a sad and grim topic. Consider this segment from “6 Iraqi Policeman,” which describes the aftermath of a bombing (it is never made clear on which side the bombers belong).
The shocking blood of the men
forms an obscene art: a moustache, alone
on a sidewalk, a blistered hand’s gold ring
still shining, while a medic, Doc Lopez,
pauses to catch his breath, to blow it out
hard, so he might cup the left side of a girl’s face
in one hand, gently, before bandaging
the half gone missing.
While reading Here, Bullet, I diligently underlined selections I wanted to share in my review. Unfortunately, by the time I had finished, I had so many that I'd have nearly no review were I to include them all. There were simply too many lines, too many images, too many entire poems I'd like to quote. Instead, I'll finish with an example of Turner's ability to imbue a scene -- even one involving senseless death, as in so many of his poems -- with a certain ethereal beauty. This selection is taken from “Hwy 1” in which he describes the shooting of a crane:
Cranes roost atop power lines in enormous
bowl-shaped nests of sticks and twigs,
and when a sergeant shoots one from the highway
it pauses, as if amazed that death has found it
here, at 7 a.m. on such a beautiful morning,
before pitching over the side and falling
in a slow unraveling of feathers and wings.
In a nutshell: Excellent poetry that is both relevant and first-rate; poetry fans must not let Here, Bullet pass them by. I feel as though I'm doing him a disservice by not including more snippets of his work, but it really is best to read the poems in their entirety.
Bibliolatry Scale: 5.5 out of 6 stars
Turner’s Here, Bullet is a collection I’ve been meaning to read since its publication in 2005, when it made a splash due to its subject matter and, if I may be so bold, beauty. Here, Bullet has won several awards since it debuted, beginning with the Beatrice Hawley Award. This collection, however, doesn’t need awards to heighten its visibility; despite the fact that a poetry collection rarely garners major discussion outside of literary circles, the subject matter is important since it describes one soldier’s experiences in Iraq. As a team leader in the US Army, Turner spent a year there and he describes the people, situations, and images on both sides of the cultural and military divide. He avoids taking a clear stand on the war but instead lets his poems speak for themselves, allowing one to form his own conclusions.
I thoroughly enjoyed every poem in the collection – a rarity. I cannot understand why Publishers Weekly panned Turner's poetry when they wrote, “The verse in this book is not good, but it is, in a cultural moment that includes Cindy Sheehan, timely.” Wait, do they mean the poetry is not good? As in bad? Did they read the same Here, Bullet? Although this is no indication of his talent, Turner is educated in his field, having earned an M.F.A. from the University of Oregon, but I maintain, however, that not only is Turner talented, he is able to bring beauty to such a sad and grim topic. Consider this segment from “6 Iraqi Policeman,” which describes the aftermath of a bombing (it is never made clear on which side the bombers belong).The shocking blood of the men
forms an obscene art: a moustache, alone
on a sidewalk, a blistered hand’s gold ring
still shining, while a medic, Doc Lopez,
pauses to catch his breath, to blow it out
hard, so he might cup the left side of a girl’s face
in one hand, gently, before bandaging
the half gone missing.
While reading Here, Bullet, I diligently underlined selections I wanted to share in my review. Unfortunately, by the time I had finished, I had so many that I'd have nearly no review were I to include them all. There were simply too many lines, too many images, too many entire poems I'd like to quote. Instead, I'll finish with an example of Turner's ability to imbue a scene -- even one involving senseless death, as in so many of his poems -- with a certain ethereal beauty. This selection is taken from “Hwy 1” in which he describes the shooting of a crane:
Cranes roost atop power lines in enormous
bowl-shaped nests of sticks and twigs,
and when a sergeant shoots one from the highway
it pauses, as if amazed that death has found it
here, at 7 a.m. on such a beautiful morning,
before pitching over the side and falling
in a slow unraveling of feathers and wings.
In a nutshell: Excellent poetry that is both relevant and first-rate; poetry fans must not let Here, Bullet pass them by. I feel as though I'm doing him a disservice by not including more snippets of his work, but it really is best to read the poems in their entirety.
Bibliolatry Scale: 5.5 out of 6 stars
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