Reprise
Reprise is a brief, affecting poetry collection that seeks meaning amid political chaos.
Victor Marrero’s Reprise is a collection of eleven poems on the time between the world wars and the rise of tyranny, grief, and repetition.
The book begins by discussing the importance of seeing corruption and not hiding from it, as well as learning from history. The first poem, “Reprise,” focuses on foretelling the rise of fascism based on connections to the past, and “Foreboding” with watching those fears come true. Other entries, including “A Star is Born,” show the false glory in the rise of fascist regimes, while “Acolyte Cerdo” focuses on the cult-like passivity of those who follow them.
The poems are written in free verse, with no set structure to their meters and rhyme schemes; most are made up of handfuls of long stanzas. There are several repeated phrases, as with calls out to William Butler Yeats and W. H. Auden to signal shifts away from self-reflection toward examinations of history; from the other poets’ perspectives, the entries move toward clear-sighted looks at history, conveying thoughts without connection to the current moment.
The imagery pulls from a range of eras and often evokes classical motifs. “Yeats. Auden. Poets all” is reminiscent of both prophecy and the muses. And there are references to omens and the occult: Historians “fail in divination” and a drink is referred to as a “crystal ball.” The tones of the poems are often lost and fearful, with lines focusing on horrors and expressing feeling stunned and unheard. They attempt to process the unthinkable and stand in opposition to those who tune out the disaster around them.
Though the connections between the entries are somewhat loose, they work to tell a larger story, referencing particulars as of “that dive on Fifty-Second Street” as they seek answers that eluded people in the past. They forward a poetic retelling of how the Nazis came to power, focusing on tactics of shock and awe, the fervor of Hitler’s followers, and those who did not act in time. The last poem, “Mass Resignation,” posits that the greatest threat is passivity, both from leaders who shirk their responsibilities and from people giving in to dread. At points throughout, the book zooms in on the emotional factors that lead to the erosion of democracies with the grace and seriousness of an epic, providing food for thought if not perfect answers.
Reprise is a chilling, beautiful poetry collection that speaks to tyrannies past and present.
Reviewed by
M. W. Merritt
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
