Dangerous Enough
Alison Stone
Presa Press
ISBN: 978-0-9888279-3-6

Reviewer: Cindy Hochman


Every life has blood on its shirt.
—Alison Stone, “Intimacy”

          Reading Alison Stone’s searing collection Dangerous Enough feels like childbirth—anesthesia optional—leaving one bloodied and drained, joy tinged with wince, and after a great hue and cry, blessed relief and reward. Tracing a line from some of the dark passages of capricious youth to the final chapters of our short and flimsy lives, the poet recounts the daily wombs of woe in straightforward narratives that refuse to skirt hard realities or blunt the jagged edges. From drama to dharma, and with a tone of existential defiance, Alison Stone travels a gravelly path, leaving no stone unturned.

Nothing the rabbi says is true.
A twelve-year-old girl is a half-written book.
I belong to you.

My Haftorah is about leprosy, dead or oozing skin,
how touch can ruin a person.
Then she must wear a bell and chant, unclean, unclean.

You choose me for my awkwardness…

…

The rabbi says

I’m done with childhood,
a woman,
lovely in the eyes of God.

(“Bat Mitzvah Lessons with the Cantor”)

          There is no denying that these poems contain an underlying spiritual quintessence, but the poet’s early experience of religion itself, with its inherent contradictions, inconsistencies, and hypocritical dogma, has little to do with piety, but, rather, is tied to womanhood, sex, and skewed expectations. Yet, for all her skepticism, Stone has crafted a book that bears more than a passing thematic alliance with the Bible.

          And all of life, biblical or otherwise, begins with a little blood. The Old Testament is rife with scenes of violence and filial ties, not to mention its subjugation of women, some of whom are doomed to bleed, give birth, and die. So, too, many of these poems shed both real and symbolic blood, beginning with the by-products of sexual union: menstruation, the stained sheets of reckless lovemaking, and the torn matrix of motherhood. Stone’s numerous references to blood range from benign and temporary, as in the stigmata of a hair dye job gone awry (“Krazy Kolor has bled down my forehead and looks like a wound”), to the ailing blood that flows from our anemic bodies (“Forty-five, my body bleeds/ heavily and often, loosens/ its ties to the moon”), to the blushed blood of shame and regret that, according to the poet, every life inevitably “has on its shirt.” These poems bespeak the larger picture of the female conundrum: mother’s mother bleeding into daughter, bleeding into self.

          In a poem titled “Almost Thirteen,” Stone explores the interiority of a thirteen-year-old daughter (by the tenets of Judaism, a woman), war and its resultant bloodshed providing an almost pleasant diversion:

she reads about

dead generals
distracting herself
with someone else’s war.

          It is no accident, then, that when referencing her own schooldays, the poet, in “Rocket to Russia,” harkens back to war also (“I have to/ get to school. We are/ doing one of the important wars.”). Perhaps, in both cases, a bit of historical schadenfreude can do much to take the edge off internal skirmishes; after all, other people’s wars always seem less intense than our own.

          On its face, the poem “Sex Talk Among Women” seems a lighthearted attempt to acknowledge, and thus accept, the crude language often targeted at the female gender, particularly in matters of a carnal nature:

Nail, screw, drive, thrust, penetrate, and pork.
We build our lives with words

and yet have never heard or read engulf,
surround, enfold.

          The ante is raised, however, by the poet’s “if you can’t beat ’em, then join ’em” poem “Twat Ghazal,” the end-line phrase—“down there”—appropriately chosen by the poet (“down there”being, in terms of this book’s central discourse, where it all began). But, to a poet, there is nothing more crucial than linguistics and, here, words themselves become a conduit for the quelling of voice and the powerlessness it can render. Rereading the former poem, the reader sees now how the poet calls upon her maternal instincts to soften the blow of words such as “screw”and “thrust” by using the words “surround” and “enfold,” thereby summoning visions of nurturing mother and protected child.

          Surprisingly, at its core, this book is less about coupling than it is about separation in its manifold forms. The poems are impregnated throughout with the imagery of severance and what can be taken away from us: what is ripped away from our bodies and from our hearts, what trusts are breached; or, in the Caesarean sense, breeched. Luckily, we are very good at distracting ourselves with other wars.

          In the poem “Acceptable,” Stone fires off a litany of what was unacceptable to her father (i.e., “backtalk,” “any type of lettuce besides iceberg,” “Democrats,” “dog sweaters,” and “Women’s Lib”). Protestations aside, however, the poet is now herself ensconced within the symbols of conformity, which in some ways proves no less dangerous a war than rebellion. That said, implicit to the domestic details of this poem is the understanding that reaching grown-up milestones compels us to assume responsibilities, commitments, and connections, and to embrace the reality that (whether or not we believe in God) mortality will eventually visit us.

          Ironically, the poem that forms the crux of the book’s menacing title (“Amtrak 137”) is the one that offers the most comic relief, the harsh facts of life being at least momentarily replaced by comparatively minor annoyance:

I hope I’m dangerous enough. Bad
breath, bitten cuticles, the wad of shredded
tissue I blow into,
                                      anything
to make this loud, round, sweaty
                                      stranger shrink
to his side of the seat.

          Alison Stone is a feminist’s feminist. Despite the pits and pockmarks acquired along the way, it is clear that neither sticks nor stones have broken this woman’s bones. And despite the fact that

our deepest prayers answered
No,
the rest of us get
diapers, morphine, feeding tubes,
daily losses and indignities…

(“Not on the List”)

the poet still makes a case for life’s celebratory essence: that our bodies are strong enough to withstand these indignities and where they lead; that we may have garnered some wisdom and grace amid our blood’s restive ruckus; and perhaps proving that you can get blood from a stone.

          Kudos go to Presa Press for their impressive, yet unpretentious, publishing of vital and vigorous voices such as Alison Stone’s.

          Notwithstanding their lovely and subtle crafting, these poems— these stones—aim for (and smack right into) the solar plexus. Early on, the poet states that she was “on my way to everywhere.” She got there, but (as happens when having a baby), the process left a scar.