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tailwhip's review
5.0
Graphic: Alcohol, Gun violence, Violence, Animal death, Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Mental illness, Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Homophobia, and Toxic relationship
tinygayturtle's review
5.0
Moderate: Bullying, Homophobia, Blood, and Death
penofpossibilities's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: Alcohol, Animal death, Suicide, Sexual content, Hate crime, Gun violence, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Blood, Violence, Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Self harm, Homophobia, Fire/Fire injury, and Death
Moderate: Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Incest, Medical content, and Murder
Minor: Cancer, Religious bigotry, and Police brutality
norrell's review
2.25
a. hands
b. glass
c. death and blood
d. knives and guns
e. stars
+the language of passion, mourning and violence
etc.
It’s also really gay.
All of this half-joking sentiment aside - the language is accessible and sometimes surprisingly rich, the thoughts not so much. Funnily enough, roughly half of the lines perplexed me while the other half seemed so… uninspired, bland - cliché if you will. Although I must admit a few stuck around (the liked quotes and a few other lines).
There is a grander emotional narrative being spun but all in all the poems moreso overlap and mingle, with leitmotifs galore, rather than form a story.
Much of the deeper meaning escapes me as I haven’t been able to scratch under the surface yet. This is possibly due to my dislike of Siken’s way of writing poetry, the sheer (literal and thematic) repetition of it bludgeoned any patience and interest left in me (as it rarely worked, in my opinion). I don’t know.
But there’s something missing, unfulfilling here. The collection felt like flashing images.
To conclude, Richard Siken’s poetry just doesn't speak to me and I've made my peace with that fact.
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Suicide and Suicidal thoughts
bemsjames's review
5.0
Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Alcohol, Car accident, Gun violence, Sexual content, Grief, and Homophobia
artlyna_'s review
5.0
Graphic: Blood, Death, Gun violence, Hate crime, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Homophobia and Sexual content
calcifowl's review
5.0
Graphic: Homophobia, Violence, Death, Blood, and Suicidal thoughts
parisa0npluto's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.5
Graphic: Death and Blood
potahto's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
5.0
Moderate: Homophobia, Violence, and Death
b0ygenius's review
5.0
[first read, oct. 5 2021] the best way to describe the way this made me feel is that it made me sick to my stomach. there is this heavy lump that sits here, low in my stomach every time i read or even think about this and i feel like i will throw up because there is So Much going on inside of me and it needs to go somewhere. i can’t keep all of this inside. the amount of times i violently sobbed reading this is. insane
i tried to make a list of my favorites as i read but i eventually gave up when i realized i was adding pretty much all of them to it. i will say, though, that i have memorized scheherazade and half of little beast from reading them so much, and “we pull our boots on with both hands but we can’t punch ourselves awake, and all i can do is stand on the curb and say ‘sorry about the blood in your mouth. i wish it were mine.’ i couldn’t get the boy to kill me, but i wore his jacket for the longest time.” has been rattling around my head for the past 48 hours. so.
now i understand those stories where people sell their souls to the devil for the ability to sing, to act, to dance, to write. i would give everything i can get my hands on and more to write something like this. to even understand humanity and love and violence and emotions and identity enough to put it into words like that.
jesus fucking christ. sometimes i forgot how much reading makes me feel alive
[4th full read (?), march 13 2022] i don't think crush will ever stop making me feel the way it does. i have read it so many times at this point and every single time i do i still feel it clawing at my insides. i have a physical copy that has a permanent place on my nightstand bc of how much i pick it up to read a poem or two or when i have a particular line stuck in my head and i pick it up just to stare at that line. i have a pdf copy on my computer that is very heavily annotated. as i write this i just came off of a ~1 hour session of me just scrolling thru the pdf and writing stuff down, noting themes and such. i just Love crush so much i don't even know how to put it into words all i can do is just Beg literally anyone who will listen to read it. all my friends are probably sick of me trying to recommend it to them. i can't get it out of my head
[lost count of rereads, march 26 2022] not even two weeks since my last full reread and it still just breaks me. every single poem is brilliant. like i cannot stress enough how this completely changed the way i read and look at poetry. like, i Get It now. i get why people spend all this time breaking apart complex poems line by line because it is Worth it. even when i was reading crush for the first time and i missed all the connections and complex metaphors i still Loved it. it was like, “this is incredible and it’s making me so many things and i don’t understand what it all means but i really want to” and i have spent so long picking it apart and analyzing the metaphors and double meanings and all that and it was so worth it and so fun and every time i read crush it gets better and i just. i cant even put it into words like this changed my life i’m so serious god please read this
Graphic: Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Hate crime, Medical content, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Violence, Death, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, and Mental illness