Book Review: Clever Gretel
Clever Gretel. Jennifer Dotson. Chicago Poetry Press, March 24, 2013, Paperback, 96 pages.
Review by Cronin Detzz.
Clever Gretel by Jennifer Dotson is primarily a light-hearted, witty collection of poems – even though it reads more like prose that occasionally rhyme – that leaves readers feeling as though they’re engaged in a friendly conversation with the writer over a cup of coffee.
In Clever Gretel, Dotson writes about her personal perspective of everyday occurrences with clever poem titles such as, "Wonder Woman is in My Yoga Class" and "Why I Don't Eat Oatmeal." It takes a certain amount of skill and finesse to write about the mundane, but Dotson pulls it off and more as she tackles events like cleaning and oiling her old bedroom dressers, riding in an elevator, doing a backstroke ("I am a mermaid with goggles") and eating creamed chipped beef on toast.
Dotson is also able to project herself into other people's shoes – literally – when she writes, "I must smile when I am / ignored by women who / think I'm a Barbie... / the Agency doesn't care / that my feet ache and swell / in my high heeled shoes."
The poetry is so visceral it makes one wonder if perhaps Dotson herself has worked a fragrance counter. But that’s the impact of a poet's imagination: one never knows if a poem arises from personal experience or from a poet's ability to imagine another emotional world.
If you are in the mood to poetically reflect on the seemingly small details of your life, read Clever Gretel. You may come to realize the magnitude of the beauty in your own life's microcosm.