Teethmarks

Lydia Forssander-Song is a sessional instructor in the English
Department at Trinity Western University, Langley, B.C.

Teethmarks is Sina Queyras’s second collection of poetry. Her first
collection, Slip, was published in 2001. Teethmarks is divided into four
sections: “Jersey Fragments,” “Dizzy, or, My Mother’s Life as
Cindy Sherman,” “Eight Small Stones,” and “Bridging and
Tunnelling.” Prose poems stand out in this collection. The third
section, for example, is made up of eight prose poems, including the
title poem, “Teethmarks,” which refers to teethmarks on a Barbie
doll’s breasts made by a puppy.

All but two of the prose poems have a strong narrative quality. One
exception is the highly fragmented “The Deer of New Jersey,” in
which Queyras makes good use of association and juxtaposition to create
a razor-sharp edge: “What is patriotism? Burnt sumac. Squirrel food.
Heading off to Afghanistan. Deer with bent necks. Bloodied mouths. What
is terror? Delicate lips. Someone says they are hoping for
domestication. Tender hooves. Bean irritant. Hoof on track. SUVs and
delivery vans. This car heading north. Why don’t deer migrate north?
Where do terrorists migrate?”

Overall, Queyras’s poems are solidly grounded on a distinct sense of
place. These various locations incisively and persistently point to
aspects of “home”: first, because of their active engagement with
and relentless interrogation of the present and the self, and second,
because of their frank and vivid portrayal of parental figures and
childhood/teenage moments. The poet’s precise and stark focus on
selfhood results in poems that are more concrete than transcendent.