Review: The pain and beauty of modern intimacy in “Closer, Baby, Closer”

Savannah Brown’s third collection of poetry is an exploration of the existential horror of knowledge and fame. Appropriately released on February 14, Brown’s new title contains her most personal work.

Savannah Brown is 26 years old and has already had an impressive literary career. From her first collection Graffiti, which featured poetry about teenage fears, to her two novels The Truth About Keeping Secrets and The Things We Can’t See, Brown’s dark, morose lyricism and wistful writing style persisted. relentless grip on readers.

Brown founded Doomsday Press, an independent publishing company, in 2022 after realizing that traditional publishing just wasn’t for her. Closer Baby Closer is her first book published as part of Doomsday.

“Closer, baby, closer” is also my favorite work of hers. While “Graffiti” contained some of her most vulnerable and related work, her second “Sweetdark” collection shows Brown entering new stylistic territory with distinct technical prowess. ‘Closer Baby Closer’ combines the stylistic maturity of ‘Sweetdark’ with the bright appeal of ‘Graffiti’, making it the strongest collection yet.

Brown demonstrates a poignant ability to describe intimate moments from past relationships with morbid concreteness, articulating an undercurrent of grief for former lovers that sometimes seems to elude words. Shortly after I finished my first reading, I wrote to my friend, “It was like she was doing open heart surgery on me and I was awake. Or like she cut me open and smeared my insides all over the glass for everyone to see.”

The book is divided into three sections, each of which embodies different stages in the development of the speaker’s perception of contemporary intimacy. The first section contains verses that describe the struggle to get to know and the loss of a once significant partner, as well as the lingering pain and resulting hesitation about forming a relationship with someone new.

One of my favorite titles from this section is “Recorded charms of intimacy.” This poem is a love letter written after a breakup that reminds the reader of the transience of a relationship that once held a monumental place in their lives. Written in a series of short, evocative descriptions – “a million hairs left on the carpet in case you need to clone me”, “wanting to hear about your day as relentlessly as a fetish” and “a word mispronounced and quickly ridiculed”. Brown describes a figurative graveyard containing the remnants of a past relationship.

“The Trouble with Other People” is another standout moment. The poem revolves around the speaker’s haunting internal conflict between the indecision to allow oneself to be known—and therefore vulnerable—and the desire to make a meaningful connection with another person. Brown’s confessional style lends a sharp and bitter edge to her poetry.

The remainder of the first section describes the speaker as she struggles with the prospect of a new romantic connection. Brown includes many verses to emphasize the drama of the experience: the awkward vagueness of a first date, the grotesquely uncomfortable encounter with a former lover at a party, the suffocating spiral of retroactive jealousy, and the irrationality that so often accompanies new love. .

The second part of “Closer Baby Closer” is an interlude featuring a long typewritten stream-of-consciousness confession resembling lines of code. Each page contains a different line of internal dialogue as the speaker reflects on the aftermath of a broken romantic relationship. This section acts as a fly-leaf for the previous one, as the following verses reflect a more assertive speaker trying to deal with the oddities of dating again in a world where physical and digital intimacy go hand in hand.

The collection’s third section shows off Brown’s ability to write works that are refreshingly modern and perfect for the digital age, often set against an apocalyptic world tinged with cosmic nihilism. In The Jeff Bezos Sexts, Brown shows off his more playful side by mocking and highlighting the absurdity of today’s capitalist society. The second part of the poem, as the title suggests, is written using only words and phrases from texts by Bezos to his former lover Lauren Sanchez that were leaked to the public in 2019. quirkiness – illustrates the low and carnal desires of one of the richest men in the world.

One of the most memorable poems in “Closer, Baby, Closer.” “THE HOTEST GIRL IN THE WORLD!!!!!” in the same vein, mentioning OnlyFans, a subscription-based online service used primarily by sex workers, and a girl “drinking gallons and gallons of oat milk.” In this poem, among others in the final section, Brown comments cynically on the social currency that sexuality has become in modern culture, portraying intimacy as a transactional act.

Throughout the book, Brown shifts from the emotional to the physical, with poetry exuding eroticism and sensuality. “Closer Baby Closer” can be seen as a kind of coming of age story in which the speaker walks away from important relationships and then accepts and asserts their sexual identity in the digital age. The subject matter of Brown’s work in the third part of the book is noticeably more light-hearted, with her biting tone and caustic wit that makes her writing unexpectedly humorous at times.

“Closer Baby Closer” is a reflection on the obscurities of modern romance. Reading in chronological order, we see the speaker inflicting and overcoming grief, and then withdrawing from their original perception of intimacy. Brown’s latest issue seduces the reader with insightful and profound remarks on the pain and beauty of human relationships. Closer Baby Closer is available worldwide from Doomsday Press today and is Brown’s Valentine’s Day gift to all those who are also obsessed with the idiosyncrasies of modern relationships.

Contact Stephanie Wong at [email protected]