Tempered Steel: a review of 24 Poems by John Yamrus

Tempered Steel: a review of 24 Poems by John Yamrus. Meat For Tea Press. Holyoke, Mass. 2023. $14.00 paper.

This book ends with an image of a boy pulling stuffing out of a sofa, and begins with an image of a mother combing her young son’s hair. Similarly, John Yamrus sifts for truth from events of day to day life. One distinction of the beginning poem is that the boy’s friend stands in the kitchen, where the sink feels cold against the son’s skin. That friend, “always Stephen, never Steve” represents the world coming between mother and son, a world with other people. The sink feels cold against the son’s skin. But the world itself with its harsh and wonderful reality is not cold, rather, lived in. There’s a small hole in a sofa the boy, with innate curiosity, pokes his finger in, and begins to sift out stuffing, a memory from childhood readers can surely relate to. The book begins and ends with tactile images. The poet touches upon truths. Also the fact of mortality. The tenderness, toughness and humor in these poems gives dignity to the experience of being alive.

Tenderness is unique, particularized; it bears the stamp of personality, and is pervasive in these poems. The first poem is titled “i remember the last time,” the last time a mother combed her son’s hair. What is particular here is that there’s an onlooker in this intimate moment, Stephen. The poem shows, describes, and the telling startles:

i
felt
young and
stupid and ashamed.

What is suggested is that the speaker, the man reflecting on this childhood moment, felt this way because of Stephen, the third party’s presence. That third party is central, and suggests without Stephen there’d be no poem. Stephen represents the world, and the world is not outside but inside the kitchen, this place of familiarity to the mother and her son. There will always be a Stephen, Stephen is the other in this poet’s world. Notice “felt” is on a line all by itself. Just as the boy feels “the/ sink was/ cold against my skin” he feels the other’s presence because others are inclusive in his world, and in these poems.

Toughness, like tenderness is rendered in originality. In “he was” the speaker encounters graffiti on a wall, not unusual. But the graffiti itself startles in its contradictory tone: “Fuck the world—/ and Fuck you if you don’t love it.” This “found” oxymoron speaks for itself, and not without wry humor. What is really strange is what happens “later that week.”

he
went back

and when he got there, it was gone —

not
just the words

and
the wall,

but
the whole
damn building

Did this, this whole experience really happen? It happened in the poet’s imagination, and happens in the poem. It suggests toughness, the toughness of living in the world, and the ethereal nature of things, not only the graffiti and the wall but the whole building. In “what” the speaker begins “makes it/ so special, he said/ is knowing that it’s all gotta end.” And that someday he will have “nothing more to say.” A key word in “what” is “knowing.” In the speaker’s knowing there’s a toughness, a resilience. Unlike the wall, the building that gets knocked down, the speaker, knocked down, gets up.

There is humor in these poems, a wry humor that comes from the wisdom of experience. That the speaker takes himself seriously is suggested because he doesn’t take himself too seriously. Putting things in perspective he can laugh at things and situations and at times at himself. In the first of two poems titled “he” he talks about writing in an original way.

he’d get up in the morning,
have his coffee…

walk out
with the dog

and
write a poem.

he
never went back
to correct or change a line.

The poem concludes:

he
said he
learned it
from the dog,
who (he claimed)
was a better poet than him.

That the poet respects himself and others is suggested, at times, by a thoughtful self-depreciating stance. Take yourself seriously, but putting things in perspective, don’t take yourself too seriously. There’s a time and place for being able to laugh at oneself. That setting is…a poetry reading! The next-to-last poem in the collection is “i think.” With its precise imagery, exacting phrasing, and humor, it’s worthy of inclusion in an anthology. Simply put, the poet is in attendance at this fairly long reading and eventually gets up to leave while the reading is still going on. He spills wine on himself, on the table, on all his papers, and of course everyone sees. What embarrassment! Only he makes it falling down funny. He can do that, because he does not hesitate to be himself.

Twenty Four Poems includes film and literature. It also includes animals. When the poet said the dog was a better poet than he, he was only half kidding. When he writes in “it was” about having to have a dog put down, he writes poignantly of that experience of loss, as only a dog lover who happens to be a skilled poet can do. A lesser poet might have lapsed into sentimentality, but not this poet. In poem after poem the showing and telling are “on the mark,” and the result are unique experiences that show us what we might otherwise overlook and gently, toughly remind us of all it means to be alive. These poems render unique experiences in language that makes them memorable.