Assignment #6

For this assignment I chose Give Me Gray by Kimberley Bertrand. Kimberley Bertrand is an adjunct writing professor at SUNY Canton College in Canton, New York. Give Me Gray is her first book of poetry and focuses on the meditations of life and is a testimony to human existence. Bertrand divides the book into four sections: portraits, spirituality, sexuality, and perspectives. Each section has three to six poems that describe the section in some way or form. For example, in the first section, Portraits, every poem paints a vivid picture of some common scene, experience or thought in life. In the section, Spirituality, the title of the poem appears in a poem entitled, Give Me Gray. This poem is a prayer of sorts to God that asks, “just give me gray.” This poem and the book of poems promote a simplistic style of life where eccentricities and luxuries are not needed, all one needs is a “lifeline” to hold you to this earth. All the poems have a simplistic nature with a simplistic structure. For example, the poem entitled, Among the English, compares the serene life of an Amish person to the complex, hectic life of a modern person.

The poems in this book are a bit too simplistic for my taste. The author seems to be trying to grand amazing conclusions that are eye opening and revealing from common ideas. The overarching theme of the book is that the only thing you need to find meaning in life is to find a necessity in your life. This theme is intriguing and unique; however, the poems that Bertrand uses to portray this theme are rather bland and overused. Many of the poems seem to be very cliché and underdeveloped. In contrast to the majority of the poems, a few of the poems stood out above the rest. It was from these few that the meaning of the book became clear and that Bertrand’s talent was revealed. The poems Give Me Gray and Red Sky clearly stated in unique terms that life was about the simple things that connect you to this world.