Poetry School of Experience Revisited: The War Doesn’t End
Book Review by Rob Greene
Undress, She Said
by Doug Anderson.
Four Way Books, 2022,
$17.95 USD, paper.
Poetry School of Experience Revisited: The War Doesn’t End
Book Review by Rob Greene
Doug Anderson’s collection—Undress, She Said—has hooks and turns as effective as a James Wright last line. Just ask “Pastor Fred” who felt the crisp belt of one of Anderson’s deft hooks and turns [32].
Many of us are taught to fight for our lives, whether as kids, soldiers, or civilians looking back on traumatic experiences. Doug Anderson’s latest collection Undress, She Said is full of empathetic touchstones, conveying understanding for others in the battle to stay alive through shared experiences of war, addiction, recovery, loss, love, work, caretaking, and fear.
I opened the book directly to Part II, titled, The War Doesn’t End. I can see why the editors at Four Way Books want this chapter to function as a spine, splitting the center of the book, as it contains elements of war and platoon camaraderie, and conveys empathy even for the enemy in a time of war.
In Anderson’s poem “Splibs and Chucks,” we witness a brotherhood among those who are Black along with those who are white who were likely “taught to hate each other in some funky ass bean town in Mississippi” [53]. We see the loss of a brother, through images that give us a glimpse of our own losses, whether to war or other tragedy. We, too, have seen the grim silhouettes in the shadows that mirror images of those from our past.
On the trip “Driving Down Route 9 Last Night” we motor on by the Veterans’ hospital, where some of us hallucinate in the radical dark either by way of the effects of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) or Schizophrenia. I am not positing the speaker has either of these conditions though I, as the reviewer, have both these illnesses, so I can easily see the hallucinatory images Anderson conjures up from his memories of the Vietnam war. Yes, such experiences are valid and yes, they are believable.
For his ability to unflinchingly speak freely of his time in the military, I have much respect and admiration for Doug Anderson, who shares careful and thoughtful expressions on moments in history when Americans were sent to burn “the poisoned land, for reasons that grow dimmer every year we were sent to fight” [60].
Though we are Veterans from different eras with different experiences, I can visualize the images in Anderson’s poems, as they contain extensive and layered tenors that ride inside the vehicles of the multi-tiered metaphors. These poems have the ability to resonate with service members and also with civilians.
In “Killing with a Name,” we see American platoon members pull a five-foot Vietnamese man from the hole he was battling from, to see his face. Never again could the poet call the Vietnamese people by the names the Americans of that time were taught to say, to vilify the enemy. I shall follow the poet’s example and not repeat the racist epithets that were used to animalize the people of Vietnam, but we must reckon with the consequences of the propaganda that comes with war. As stated in the poem, ”Killing with a Name,” while in the village, it was somewhat easier to “kill its vermin” than it was to harm innocent human beings.
Time and again throughout this book, we are met with Anderson’s bravery to speak out to those who can and do empathize and sympathize with him. In his poem “The Good Doctor,” some readers will recognize that “flattened affect” and appreciate it; some of us speak in a blunted affect as we are suppressing our trauma and experiences. At the same time, Anderson writes “of things too dreadful for others to speak of without trembling” [61].
In lighter moments of the war, if that is possible, Anderson’s poem “Fishing on the Lunar New Year” shows us how some fished with grenades. Yes, a first grenade toss, or drop can make your palms sweat and your knees will shake. In the poem “Little Chi” we meet a kid selling popsicles on a 120-degree day to the soldiers on both sides. Little Chi reminded me of Ernest Hemingway when he served chocolates and cigarettes to the soldiers. The battle arrived directly in Little Chi’s homeland, and he likely had no choice except to find a purpose during these hellish times.
However, in the poem “The War Doesn’t End” we see signs of xenophobia among the people of today’s Vietnam. Those who are of other races and nationalities, including “Amerasians,” the children of soldiers, are unwelcome by some, even if Vietnam is the only home they have known. When soldiers set out on foreign lands, the illegitimate children created in times of war—and their mothers—have no recourse to be supported by their military fathers deployed overseas. There are many born during times of war, and many of these kids are at risk of exclusion and extreme poverty. Anderson’s poem reminds us of all those who are left behind, and no, “The War Doesn’t End” for them.
To illustrate the effectiveness of his craft, in particular his ability to convey empathy and care via the imagery and tenors of this collection, I shall close out this review with Doug Anderson’s poem “Somewhere South of Danang, 1967.” And yes, the last line gives us hope for a better tomorrow:
At dawn we sit in ambush outside the village.
A cat emerges from the ground fog,
sniffs the air, passes through us
with indifference. The sun
turns the fog to spun glass.
Spiderwebs with drops of dew
hang in the trees.
We see a saffron shape
coming through the fog.
Safeties are eased off. Fingers
rest lightly on triggers.
A young monk emerges from the fog,
kneels on the ground in front of us
closes his eyes and frowns.
We check his ID and send him
on his way. A rooster crows in the village.
Someone lights a fire. We will not fight today.
Review published in The Fool's World precursor
Saint Augustine's Magazine Vol. 2, No. 1 (2023).