Book review: Seasons from the Second Floor, by Nathan Graziano

Seasons From The Second Floor is Nathan Graziano's third collection of poetry.  It contains 19 poems, most of which are shorter than a page and a half.  These are working class, blue collar poems -- not the academic poems found in many literary journals.  The poems are divided into four different sections by season -- "Night Walking In The Fall," "Winter Potatoes," "The Ants Prepare For Spring," and "Summer Specials."

The poems in this book are all narrative first-person poems, recounting various aspects of Graziano's life.  They span a broad range, from the mildly humorous (such as "Exercise") to the bluntly satirical (like "Living On Grove St.").  The poems are mainly written in short lines, for the most part with no wasted detail or drawn-out phrases.  Graziano writes well with shorter lines, such as these lines from "Potatoes Until Friday":

Thursday night. We stared

at a plate of homefries

and prayed

to a bottle of ketchup

upside-down

on the kitchen table

for one small squirt.

"My Sister On Her 23rd Birthday" and "Spring Cleaning In The Kitchen" are two of the longer poems in the book, at five and four pages, respectively.  The first poem ran slightly longer than it needed to -- the same things could have been said with less lines.  The second poem was enjoyable, and was split up nicely into contrasting sections.

Graziano's poems focus on life from a lower-class perspective -- wondering what he'd put on his dining room table if he actually had one ("The Landlord Calls"), trying to make a telemarketer understand that he has no money ("Life Insurance"), or stealing cheese and crackers from a poetry reading ("The Reading").  They are at times gritty and always accessible, exposing the world that some people will never see, even though it's right out there in front of them.

The poems are as a whole pretty good, but there are a few lines throughout the book that stand out above the rest, such as these lines from "Tonight I'm James Dean":

I want to feel like James Dean

and drip Hollywood

on the kitchen floor.

Seasons From The Second Floor is a 51-page chapbook published in 2001 by Green Bean Press.  The Green Bean Press website is no longer with us, but you can order the book from Amazon, AbeBooks, or eBay.  For more information about the poet, check out his website.

(Originally posted on Helium.com, 2009)

(Disclaimer: I earn a commission on Amazon and eBay sales made from links in this post.)