I am named for
a tiny Slavic woman who nonetheless was
the terror of her household, her
tall sons,
who grew bent and white
in her old age and died
a centenarian,
thirty years after her friends
and husband had all died too,
and I am named for
a Quebec man who changed his name
to Anderson from the French,
Henrichon,
because it sounded
too French
and he would not be able to find work
in the States if
his surname was too French
and so Andrew and not Henri
became a name for his sons,
and I am not named for
Italian and German,
but they are in me too, as
pasta and stroganoff and sauerkraut
and the memories of
a bright-eyed grandmother who fed
everyone,
mangia!
and a tall grandfather who wears
flannel shirts and writes,
like I do.
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138,521 Literary Works • 672,149 Reviews
Oh my, this is powerful.
[why didn't I assign this to myself again?]
I'm going to break this down into lists because I'm feeling listy rather than speechy. I might change in the middle.
What I loved:
- I loved the way you used origins as both what you have obviously in the character's blood, like the last names, but also that which is not so obvious, the extended family that was around and impacted the life of the character, but did not provide a name.
I think that the way you provided insights into the background is spot on. It reminded me a lot of how Collins will supply detail and as you probably know, Collins is one of my favorite poets.
- I love that you're taking a simple structure, "I am" and making it so much more complex. Really here all you're saying is that you are who you were influenced by. What makes your cultural identity is who influenced you growing up. For this character, it's all about grandparents who lived into the speaker's lifetime, and the different strong cultural identities that had to be squashed, or ones which were highlighted and celebrated. It comes through the best in the stanza about food because I know those foods and I love them, so I'm starving now. THANKS A LOT DX.
- I love that the poem has such a strong ending because the hint that this grandfather loved flannel shirts and white becomes so much more poignant when you pair it with "I do too" as you have, even if those aren't the words you used. You showed us the way that the character relates to the history through this visual of dressing a certain way and I know that it's true because I love flannel shirts because of my father, who wore them because of his father, and so forth. We're not German on that side, but things like that are passed down through the generations with different types of people and you show that in this poem.
- I like the way you transitioned from the stanza about names to the stanza about food and how you highlighted that grandmothers and mothers are often cut off of the geneological tree when their last names are forgotten. Maiden names, maiden cultures, are often ignored when we talk about who we are just because sometimes they're shoved aside, forgotten. I like that you made a point to highlight it.
Things you could improve are severely limited.
- I don't quite understand the names because "Andrew" seems first name to me now, and you use "Anderson" before instead of "Andrew" so I'm not sure if those are the same thing or not. For me, a surname would always be spelled out all the way, and I feel like it wouldn't be "Andrew Anderson" so you lost me. If you're sticking with "Anderson" then stick with "Anderson" or if it was really "Andrew" then stick with "Andrew" but pick one and stick with it. Same with Henri vs Henrichon.
- Some of your lines aren't making a big impact with being as short as they are. You should try lengthening some of them in order to create a statement with the single line as well as the whole. For instance "Because it sounded" is very fragmented. If you put that with "too" then you could leave french on it's own and that would be powerful as a noun, because nouns can do that heavy lifting, but you don't have any nouns in "because it sounded" you just have a pronoun "it" and although you could include the noun of "Henrichon" I don't think it would be that much better because you have to make it a statement with your line.
Yeah, that's all I've got.
<33 see you around.
Omg your feedback keeps making these poems sound so much better than I think they are.
xD I am feeling pretty lovey with your voice in poetry right now.
Hi Blue,
Beginning/Flow
I read through some of the other reviews and wanted to throw my 2 cents in. I did not find the opening confusing at all, I immediately took "I am named for" as a common way to phrase "I am named after", and then I also thought the flow in the poem had pretty much no issue for me, the lines were short and snappy with a few longer ones. But the lines that were longer seemed to sit on important images/phrasing like "stroganoff and sauerkraut". While I think some of the lines seemed to really draw out:
"a tiny Slavic woman who nonetheless was"
and
"a bright-eyed grandmother who fed"
and
"a Quebec man who changed his name"
it seemed like there was a pattern and reason for drawing those particular pieces out to emphasize the person more holistically and then contrastingly highlight a single phrase by itself like "everyone" or "tall sons".
Personal Connection
My favorite aspect of this poem is how you really seemed to take care to humanize each of these relatives -- which isn't always done in pieces highlighting historical people. You describe small personal conflicts and joys (like the surname being too french or the friends who died too early) -- this goes a long way in helping me connect to each element even if I don't personally have relatives like that.
I think an interesting addition would be to see if you can draw out connections to yourself in the piece a bit more, as I think this would give the poem more signficance. Even if the connection was, "I don't identify with this struggle they faced" or "I also have friends and eat stroganoff" I think it would add to the piece. Especially because the title is "origin" and then the reoccurring theme is "I am named for" -- I just wanted a little bit more of you in the piece, even if it was a culminating stanza at the end.
Imagery
Overall, I loved that I could picture your imagery and it sort of put me as the reader in the setting of these past relatives from the tiny slavic woman and the "growing bent". I think the second stanza could use a bit more imagery imparted somewhere and even the third stanza could have a bit more to really make the characters become real for the reader.
I thought everything about the formatting seemed consistent, clean, and made sense -- no complaints there, and no spelling issues that I could see.
This was an enjoyable piece to read and gave me the feeling of looking at like old photos of relatives in photo books, of people I never knew but want to find some connection with. Thanks for sharing your piece!
And please let me know if you have any questions about my review or wanted feedback on an element that I missed.
~alliyah
Yeah, putting myself into the poems more seems like a recurring issue in my home/origin/about me poems. Thank you so much for your feedback!
You're welcome!
Hello BlueAfrica! Kara here for a (hopefully) quick review!
I am named for
great job, though. Keep up the great work.
Give me your soul.With that aside, I'm not the best at poetry but here we go!
Bold = grammar and flow issues.
Italics = suggestions and overall
Strikethrough= removeUnderline = krazy Kara komments.
Spoiler
a tiny Slavic woman who nonetheless was
the terror of her household {and} her
tall sons,
who grew bent and white
in her old age and died
a centenarian,
thirty years after her friends
and husband had all died too{b.}
andI am named fora Quebec man who changed his name
to Anderson from the French { - }
Henrichon { - }
because it sounded
too French
and he would not be able to find work
in the States if
his surname was too French {you already mentioned it once, so you probably shouldn't mention it again}
and so Andrew and not Henri
became a name for his sons{.}
{But} I am not named for {an}
Italian and German,
but they are in me too, as
pasta and stroganoff and sauerkraut
and the memories of
a bright-eyed grandmother who fed
everyone,
mangia! {What is that?}
and a tall grandfather who wears
flannel shirts and writes,
{just} like I do.
Overall, a beautiful poem, but with quite a few flow issues. I have fixed them for you
Why haven’t you given me your soul yet? --
Kara
Thanks, but could you give me some thoughts on the other aspects of the poem? I think flow is easiest to fix, so I prefer to leave focus on that for the end, when the rest of the poem is the way it should be. What did you think of the imagery and the idea behind the poem? Did you feel like anything was lacking?
Very nice poem! Love the whole meaning of it. But I will agree with the other reviews,
threw me off. Since that was the first line, I was confused at the beginning but soon came to realize what you actually meant. Maybe consider revising? Other than that, it was really wonderful.The beginning threw me off. I believe the correct term would be 'I am named after'.
I think you could use a better word then 'tiny'. It doesn't fit very well, and could be more specific.
Overall, it was a very nice poem. It flowed well, and there weren't many choppy parts. I enjoyed reading it, great job.
Sweet poem, but I think there was one recurring error that I noticed in particular:
I think it should be 'named after' as this makes more sense and as far as I know is more grammatically correct. The rest was really good though, and I particularly like the last line - it just brings the whole thing together wonderfully.
Great job and keep on typing
Icy.