If you’ve never enjoyed poetry once in your whole life—if even the word “poetry” makes you want to fall asleep, or die—you should read Karen Finneyfrock’s new book of poetry, Ceremony for the Choking Ghost. Finneyfrock (a local slam poet, Hugo House writer in residence, and novelist) writes poetry with muscular verve and narrative push. The depth and breadth suggested in just a few polished images placed next to each other will make you reconsider what poetry can do.

Finneyfrock is a natural storyteller, which means that the airy detachedness that many associate with poetry is nowhere to be found. Each of her poems is fixed, rock-solid, in space and time. She tells the story of Lot’s wife,

…an ocean has dried itself on my tongue.
So instead I will stand here, while my
     body blows itself
grain by grain back over the Land of
     Canaan

and imagines a lost city built by elephants, “trumpeting river water over their/rapturous hides.” Her vision expands to observe galaxies with “the legs of pole dancers,/the arms of Sufis” and contracts to the personal: “My vibrator acts like a furious/moth, beating itself against my clitoris as if I were a bug light.”

Even in occasional seizures of cliché (“The Newer Colossus,” a poem about immigration told from the point of view of the Statue of Liberty, reeks of poor poetry-slam impulses taking control of the author), she finds some clear new vision tucked inside (“My optimist heart corrodes in the salt wind”).

Finneyfrock’s best poems are works of memoir. Ceremony returns, again and again, to the death of her own sister, Beth, by heart failure:

…I prayed for a car accident
on the highway, a gang shooting that
     missed the chest.
Heart transplants are always a result of
     tragedy, old
and satisfied hearts won’t work.

Taken as a whole, the stories in Ceremony form what Hollywood types call “a character arc,” a narrative about the guilt of living when other, more worthy souls cannot. Finneyfrock’s voice is confessional without the cloying exhibitionism of a memoirist, and self-assured without the cockiness you find in many modern poets.

In Reality Hunger, David Shields claims that he has grown frustrated with novels because “you have to read seven hundred pages to get the handful of insights that were the reason the book was written.” Finneyfrock’s poems, then, are Shields’s perfect novels: a shelf full of long, elaborate, heartfelt books that have been whittled down to their bare, sharp skeletons. recommended

Karen Finneyfrock reads Fri March 12, Elliott Bay Book Company, 7 pm, free.

18 replies on “Constant Reader”

  1. I’m not sure if I love you or hate you. I love this book, but was kind of surprised to see a review of anything poetry in the stranger or to even see that the stranger is still operating. Well, I’m sure this review will make the book sales positively spike. LOL.

  7. Genius-worthy…
    Finneyfrock, Tara Hardy, Carol Guess, Shields, Evison, Ryan Boudinot, Brian at the Hugo House. For the life of me I can’t spell his last name.

    …all better candidates. Nufer is really boring.

  12. Nufer? Boring? I never thought I’d hear that one.

    He’s my favorite writer in Seattle, but then again he hasn’t released a book since 2008, and I believe his next one will take a while to come out.

    How about John and Christine, the proprietors of Open Books? They do a lot for literature in Seattle, and they’ve given us a store with one of the best poetry selections in the US. Booksellers of that caliber deserve the title of Genius (and lots of $$$).

  14. Brian McGuigan has been busting his hump for several years with “Cheap Wine and Poetry” – not to mention his role in events and classes at Hugo House. Plus, he’s a terrific writer in his own right.

  16. Wow–it’s not often that one’s name gets mentioned in Slog comments favorably. Thanks to @shy girl, @shyboy and @Hillbill for the love. I appreciate it.

    While I could definitely use the 5K, I’m voting for Karen or Ryan. Karen gets the slight edge because her book came out this year. Lots of good folks getting tossed around here though. You have your work cut-out for you, Constant.

  17. Stranger recommended two of Paul Nelson’s readings this year as must-sees, and his book, A Time Before Slaughter, is part local history, part personal history and one of the more innovative books of poetry from a local author I’ve seen this year. Definitely Genius-nominee worthy.

  18. Would anyone who claims to “hate poetry” even be reading this review, or looking at the literature section of this paper? Airy detachment?

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