Oh no, not again.  The Slam Master sighs, pushes back her chair a few inches, drums her fingers impatiently on the keyboard.  The evening is progressing, and there are scores of submissions left to read. The Slam Master hopes for tales of exotic places, fascinating characters, courageous endeavors. As usual, however, the submissions box is filled with just one thing: Love poems. Stories of secret crushes, carried on through furtive glances across school hallways. Stories of happy romantic paradises, brimming with flowers and song.  Stories of sudden, devastating break-ups that render the earth unlivable. The first poem of this kind is tolerable.  The tenth is depressing. The fiftieth… The Slam Master takes a deep breath to fortify herself.

The thing is, the Slam Master isn’t completely hard-hearted.  (Or she doesn’t think so.) She knows that love happens to everyone, and she knows that it is important.  Nothing is more important, at the time.  But the Slam Master also knows that love happens in exotic places… that fascinating characters fall in love… that love is often a courageous endeavor.  So where is all the excitement in these pieces?  Why does it seem, inexplicably, that she has read each one a hundred times before? Is love poetry just a hopeless genre, she wonders?

Then, suddenly, the Slam Master sits up straight in her chair.  Here is something different.  It’s a love story, but it doesn’t look familiar.  There are flowers in this story, but they are not just flowers: they are geraniums and honeysuckle and coriander, hibiscus and lily white and eglantine rose.  There is song, but it is not just any song: it is a rough sea shanty, or it is the voluptuous song of a nightingale or a shrill diva.  There are awkward glances, but they do not take place in a school hallway: they happen in a pumpkin patch, of all places, among the “spiny stale vines.” The story is called “Language of Flowers,” and the author, ladyamalthea, has somehow managed to take all the clichés and forge them into something new, something that sparkles with specificity.

And here is another stroke of luck for our weary Slam Master, beginning with an unusual title: “Ubi Sunt” – Where Are? It is a phrase passed down from the great Latin poets, through Anglo-Saxon riddle books and medieval ballads, an old expression of nostalgia.  But this author, EFC, has no intention of using grand generalities. Instead, she focuses on the mundane reminders of her love’s departure: the crumpled pillow, the glasses left in the sink, “the last sip of milk / From the cereal bowl.” The Slam Master is intrigued.  Now she can care about this character, too, because she knows some intimate things about him.  Maybe every person who saw this guy on the street today knows that he has lovely blue eyes and messy blond hair.  But only someone who loves him knows that he has a habit of leaving that last sip of milk in his cereal bowl.

After moving “Ubi Sunt” and “Language of Flowers” onto the list of keepers, the Slam Master leans back in her chair again and considers.  Maybe, she hazards, it’s not about the subject, but about specificity.  Could there be hope for romantic poems after all, if every poem were as unique as its writer? Could there be a thousand great love stories written, a million great love stories, if they all included details as memorable as these?  The Slam Master leans close to her computer screen again and eagerly returns to the submissions list.  If Slammers can write love poems and love stories like that, she can’t wait to read them.

Cheers,

Ann Pedtke
Slam Master