Many
of Allen’s poems are inspired by her upbringing in Texas, such as “Practical
life skills,” which details the memory of a fishing trip with her father. The descriptions
feel nostalgic—“ We
pull up to the dock with three picnic chairs as crickets chirp”— but there’s
something darker simmering beneath the surface. Take the final stanza:
In dark matter
water and wonder what it would be like to live away from
A cliff then You
catch a blowfish and bang its head up against the concrete
On top of the dock
we watch it die You didn’t have to kill it
You throw it in an
empty cooler we continue hooking I share all your names.
“You didn’t have to kill it” has a satisfying sting, and that feeling is echoed throughout the collection. Each poem is dressed in layers of nostalgia, darkness, and resilience. This is especially apparent in the poems with religious overtones, such as “Sermon notes” and the five “Our Father’s house,” poems. In each of these, she criticizes the expectations Christianity thrusts onto its followers. “Most calvaries have dead people” highlights this theme of unwilling martyrdom, where Allen writes:
like Our Father
when he gives me
his issues
places them in my
spine lets me,
sew skin into skin
without thread
and tells me to
walk
to a city where i
am given something more
than a man
whose obligation
is to no one, not even
the Blood
As with the rest of her work, “Most calvaries have dead people” covers a lot of ground. Allen isn’t just questioning organized religion, she’s calling out the forced martyrdom of women, daughters, and BIPOC members of society, and she drives this point home with the poem’s final line, something between a question and an accusation: “how could you let me spill all over town”.
The Collection Plate is a glimpse into the future of poetry where, unbound by restrictions of form, the poet’s message is free to flourish, just as Allen’s has. She knows how to make every word work for her, and each line of each poem could stand on its own; fresh, raw, and ready to leave a scar.
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Kate H. Koch writes poetry, flash fiction, and screenplays. Her work has appeared in Cholla Needles, Bombfire, Club Plum & other journals. Follow her at http://krista.place/
