Second Story: Poems

In these poems, Duhamel (Kinky) looks back at her life and its pivotal moments with aplomb and humor. These are busy, mostly free-verse poems, with a few formal ones as terza rima, pantoum, or sonnet variation. They reflect on everything from the political and social issues of the day, including the pandemic; to the possibility of an afterlife (comparing it to pushing a squeaky cart in a trip to Walmart); to Duhamel’s deceased father (calling him a man of rosaries and “Benny Hill”); to her own aging (“I’ve never hated poetry / when I was young or now that I’m old”); to Hurricane Irma, in this reviewer’s favorite poem, “Terza Irma.” The latter is a 31-page poem written as a terza rima that remembers Duhamel’s experience during Hurricane Irma in 2017. It’s filled with details like watching the news; leaving her home and staying away for several days; returning to a mess of waterlogged ceilings, furniture, and carpets; and going back to school and grading papers while worrying about a new storm.