Poet & Critic

POET ~ Michael Manerowski

Michael Manerowski is from Saint Paul, Minnesota. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Hamline University university/college in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis/St. Paul. 

“Funny thing about this world of literary journal publishing: though I’ve had a number of pieces published in recent years, very rarely do I ever hear what either editors or readers think about my work.” ~Michael Maerowski

Window to the Street

I would like the sky to shine
I would like the blue flowered sail of light
to unfurl
I would like the bouquet of light to show
her eyes

yet all day the air has been heavy
ash gray light
and cold damp wind lips longingly race to kiss stingingly
cheeks

I would like to walk the streets munching an apple
I would like to admire a few brown sparrows flitting through the elm branches
I would like to buy the woman with the long brown hair
the cup of coffee she stands in line now to buy
and plans to sit sipping
likely alone
at the window to the street gazing out
perhaps wanting an unexpected
light from above
to flower in blue

I would like I would like I would yes
I would like so many things

but the air is heavy ash
the clammy wind lips are racing and kissing my cheeks
the sidewalks are icy and slushy
I have forgotten to bring an apple
and the woman with the long brown hair has bought
her cup of coffee
already she is drinking it down
with a friend no less
she met by chance I think
talking laughing
oh the chances
in the unexpected life

and the window to the street is gazing out
at me
wondering why I am standing in the slush
being kissed by clammy wind lips
again alone
and with no apple
                           ~ Michael Manerowski

CRITIC ~ Amber Rose Crowtree

Amber Rose Crowtree is an award-winning poet whose poems have appeared widely from America to overseas. She is the author and cover-artist of two chapbooks: Harboring the Imperfect and The Inviolable Hours. She has been a poet-in-residence at the Shoals Marine Laboratory on Appledore Island (2023) and the Carl Sanburg National Historic Site online (2024). Amber has been an assistant editor for Touchtone poetry journal and a reader for Hunger Mountain Review. She grew up on the coast of Downeast Maine and now lives in rural New Hampshire. Amber earned her MFA through Vermont College of Fine Arts.

REVIEW

     The title of Manerowski’s poem, “Window to the Street,” immediately invokes a mystery, a separation of self, perhaps loneliness, therefore brings the reader into the narrator’s mind.
     Moving on to the repetition of, “I would Like…”  continues this case of inside looking-out/outside looking-in. The mild surrealism works well in the images of: “...the blue flowered sail of light to unfurl…” and “the bouquet of light” against the irony of the “ash grey” day, again pointing toward loneliness.  And in stanza three and closing, the (whichever color) apple is placed yet then displaced but stays visually interesting against the grey day and slush; the apple does exist and haunts the reader as in Adam and Eve’s apple.  
Editing suggestions:
     Perhaps the line in the second stanza rearrange to say
“…and cold damp wind-lips longingly racing 
to kiss cheeks stingingly”
     Third stanza would be visually pleasing if the second line ends at “sparrows” and begins a new line that says: “flitting through the elm branches”- (I can see that this full line perhaps represents the visual of sparrows along a tree limb as well.)
     And perhaps work the line: I would like to buy a coffee for the woman with the long brown hair

I hope I am helpful to Michael Manerwoski.  The poem is deeper than at first glance.
Sincerely,
Amber Rose Crowtree

READER REVIEW:
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