The Sealey Challenge, Day Two: If One of Us Should Fall by Nicole Terez Dutton

 

Day two of the challenge: If One of Us Should Fall by Nicole Terez Dutton. Dutton is the David H. Lynn editor of The Kenyon Review. This collection, published in 2012, is like a the best kind of road trip, with surprises (her syntax!), strange and strangely familiar road stops and sights along the way. I enjoyed both the internal and external scenery. Is the inside of the heart a landscape? Yes, but how to show that, let alone even ask that question, without being cheap or cheesy? There aren't any trite shortcuts here. 

Dutton often alternates between couplet format and prose poems, which is an interesting echo of yesterday's read. My goal for this week: write a poem in couplet format, and write a short piece as a paragraph, which some might call a prose poem.