Red Tulips, Then Asphodel by Brenda Shaughnessy

Red Tulips, Then Asphodel
Brenda Shaughnessy

Was I ever truly happy, like some girl in a red tank top
eating sunlight in Spring?

Hard to say. If flowers are symbols of emotions,
it’s still hard to say.

What belongs, what goes, and which way. Did I once
feel like a tulip

bending gracefully toward its own root, its own death,
the lower my head

the more beautiful? Or was I ever showy like a peony
for one wild week,

sexed fully pink without blushing. What are emotions
anyway? Flowers die

not knowing. And yet our feelings lead us down that one
path we only ever take,

deceptively edged with bloom after bloom after bloom.

MARGINALIA

1.
Day 29 of The Sealey Challenge. Today’s offering is So Much Synth by Brenda Shaughnessy.

2.
What happens when the bright, pulsating beats of the 80s clash with the hard truths of growing up as a girl in a world that often doesn’t feel safe? In this book, the poet takes us on a journey through the complexities of memory and identity, using the backdrop of pop culture to explore the painful contradictions of youth. The collection hums with the energy of synth music, yet it delves deep into the emotional undercurrents of growing up female in a society that both celebrates and undermines young women.

3.
I love how the poet skillfully blends nostalgia with a sharp critique of the quiet violence that often accompanies adolescence. Her poems underscore the tension between innocence and experience, the playful and the serious. She uses the rhythm of pop music as a backdrop to examining vulnerability and shame.

4.
There is also the question of memory: How do the things we once loved hold up under the weight of what we now know? Can we find joy in the past without ignoring the darker truths that were always there?