One Hundred Most Frightening Things

Andrew Brooks was Assistant Editor of Ethos magazine.

This is a fascinating, far-reaching book. Strong political convictions lie close to the surface of the work and give it a wonderful tension. Smith professes a love for red and black flags and Ernesto Cardenal’s poetry, and he dedicates the book to the FSLN, among others. The large middle section of the book deals with Mayakovsky, the Bolshevik poet and artist in whom artistic talent and the drive for revolutionary activity combined to produce a complex and fascinating life (Mayakovsky committed suicide in 1930). Mayakovsky is an appropriate subject, as the book is concerned with the conflicting pulls of artistic sensitivity and hard-headed political action. Smith handles the conflict with skill, allowing its contradictory implications to explode on the page. The second part of the book is an examination of Michael “Bommi” Baumann, an imprisoned member of the Baader-Meinhof gang.

The beginning poems in the collection have the straightforward punch of polemic — a directness partially due to Smith’s use of lists. Still, the poet does not fully participate, maintaining his distance, as in “Why I am Such a Nice Guy”: “I am even using this writing to get you to like me.” This is an appropriate poem to start with, as it cuts through conventional attitudes about authorial stance and lets Smith adopt his own unique position with the reader. Polemic is typically one-dimensional; a decision has already been taken and provides a secure basis for action or argumentation. In Smith’s hands it collapses on itself through a poet’s insistence on the autocratic nature of any decision that can allow direct, even violent action.

Smith’s studies are uncompromising. If ambiguities can be said to be accurate ones, these certainly are. The work contains all the contradictions and uncertainties of good poetry but is still written with toughness and, refreshingly, a good dose of humor.