Review: Jessica Webster

Review: Jessica Webster

Complete Me: This poem is prayer-like; it is an appeal for help. This voice is trying to follow the rules,(“be content, no more than you can bear, shall not fear, fill my soul with your word”) and finds the way unclear("it is hard…"), but not the destination. I found the minimal punctuation to be effective ("Lord, I need you now to complete me") and the indentation of the last line adds emphasis. Suggestions: spell check, bare/bear.


Inmate 321324: To me, this poem is a lament. There are some strong images (abuse, attack, negativity, weakness). Inmate 323214 is dehumanized;he wears stripes like everyone else, he is a number, no name no history. Nothing. Still, you get the sense that he made a bad choice that, for him, was chosen from a list of bad choices and that there were no other options. The reality of this kind of life seems sad and hopeless until you read that his man has something “to stand for.” I wonder what that is? Question? “Wanting nothing more than your species to be few”, which species, men? criminals? people with no choices?