Clarity and freshness, Sarah Mnatzaganian’s Lemonade in the Armenian Quarter

Sarah Mnatzaganian’s first pamphlet, Lemonade in the Armenian Quarter (Against the Grain Press, 2022), is as refreshing as the fruit it evokes and invokes. Of course, as its title immediately indicates, a key theme is origin and identity, but this is not wielded as a statement. Instead, it’s explored via fierce curiosity.

And then there’s Mnatzaganian’s use of language. This might initially seem slightly formal on the spectrum of lexical registers, as in the following choices: ‘whom’ is used instead of ‘who’, ‘until’ instead of till’, and ‘if I were’ instead of ‘if I was’. However, any lazy accusations of stiltedness can easily be dismissed due to the clarity of her sentences, which flow naturally and are easy to read. They’re far from old-fashioned, simply acknowledging a linguistic tradition behind them.

One key poem in terms of the above-mentioned theme of identity is undoubtedly ‘Juice’, dedicated ‘To my father, Aphraham’. Its closing couplet reads as follows:

…Now I want to watch your dark throat dance
while you drink.

The metrics and aural patterning are especially interesting here. Three trochees are followed by three strong syllables in the penultimate line, thus imitating the dancing movement of drinking, while the open vowels and closed consonants also follow suit. And then the final line, made up of a single anapest, stops the poem in its tracks as Mnatzaganian suddenly accelerates to its climax.

Of course, the key adjective in the above couplet is ‘dark’, especially in the context of the poems that comes immediately after it in the pamphlet, which is titled ‘Made in Hemsworth’. The penultimate stanza resonates and reflects back towards the previous poem…

Now mum knows she’s one-third Viking,
she’s proud of her pale and ageless skin,
her North Sea gaze.

In this case, the pivotal adjective is ‘pale’. By juxtaposing a father’s dark throat and a mother’s pale skin, plus the contrasting proper nouns of Aphraham and Hemsworth, Mnatzaganian is portraying the two elements of the blend that creates a person. Rather than claiming or declaring an identity, she’s working through it, portraying it, unravelling its roots, reconciling its differing facets.

The clarity, freshness and light touch of this pamphlet are the qualities that lift it out of the hubbub of contemporary poetry, especially when considered alongside Mnatzaganian’s refusal to take short cuts or reach facile conclusions. For not much more than the price of a dodgy pint in a flash London pub, Lemonade in the Armenian Quarter encourages the reader to pause, breathe in its vitality and return to everyday life, newly invigorated. Get hold of a copy for yourself and you’ll see what I mean…

Opening the floodgates, S.A. Leavesley's How to Grow Matches

When reviewing, it’s usually wise to avoid invoking a metaphor or an image that might draw attention away from the poet and towards the critic. Any such flashiness invites accusations of selfishness and flashiness, because a review should be about the book in question, not about the reviewer.

However, there are a few cases where an exception is justified, where a metaphor can enlighten and illustrate. S.A. Leavesley’s pamphlet, How to Grow Matches (Against the Grain Poetry Press, 2018), is a good example: each piece finds her opening the floodgates at a precise moment, her delicately controlled releases of anger bringing about effects many miles downstream.

One such instance occurs in the closing stanza to ’Her Cumuli Collector’:

“…The day he left, not a single wisp of white

or grey against the bright blue sky.

But it rained non-stop inside her: heavy,

pounding – the rain of dark angels.”

These lines demonstrate Leavesley’s knowledge of language’s nuts and bolts, of how to subvert them to effect, as she removes the main verb from her first sentence, thus unsettling the reader, before homing in on her clashing, conflicting final image. Moreover, her line break between “heavy” and “pounding” exacerbates that very sensation.

How to Grow Matches uses the challenging of linguistic convention to ramp up its implicit conflicts, as in the final lines of ’Bowl of oranges: a still life’…

“…She pinches her mouth closed,

tightens her heart muscle to a fist,

hands her husband a fresh orange.”

The pivotal word here is “closed”. It’s unexpected and casts a new, more powerful light on the verb that precedes it.

Anger often implies and involves the loss of control, but S.A. Leavesley shows that its impact is actually far greater when used with a deft touch. How to Grow Matches is an excellent pamphlet from a new press that deserves to find a spot at the top table of U.K. poetry pamphlet publishing. I’ll be keeping a close eye on its development.

An exciting new poetry pamphlet publisher

The emergence of a new poetry pamphlet publisher is always good news. In the case of Against the Grain Poetry Press, that excitement is compounded by the names that are behind it - Abegail Morley, Jessica Mookherjee and Karen Dennison - and a terrific initial statement of intent (see here). What's more, their submissions window is now open...