Colosseum by Katie Ford

I have to stop getting excited about books of poetry before I read them. When I bought this one, I flipped through and read a couple of poems and was all like "Damn!" as in "This poetry book looks mighty fine, my good sir." So as it was sitting on my desk I was totally pumped. But then the whole first section was a letdown. I mean, the poems in there demonstrate terrific craft, but Ford so directly and specifically deals with Hurricane Katrina that at times it felt almost pedantic, especially three years later after we've experienced and reexperienced the heartbreak and terror that it was. But, luckily, the rest of the book was pretty goddamn awesome. And I don't understand it - I mean, in the final section Ford deftly deals with Katrina on an implicit level, analyzing our place as a society in the larger more dreadful scheme of the planet's chronology by metaphorizing the Colosseum (and a society that glorified destruction, etc, look, I like to keep these short), but why couldn't she employ this inference in the first section? Anyway, it was definitely a good book of poetry, but it could have been one of the fucking great books of poetry with a bit more care which makes it a little more disappointing. PS - Sorry if all my profanity is uncalled for, Tipper Gore.

RATING: 79%