Today’s episode is guest hosted by Myka Kielbon.

TRANSCRIPT

I’m Myka Kielbon, and this is The Slowdown.

There is a certain flavor of Slowdown episode that starts “I love…” and then goes on to praise a theme that is core to the poem. During Major Jackson’s tenure as host, sometimes I would edit that beginning into his scripts.

Major had some pushback about that, because, in the classroom, he urged students to bring a more nuanced assessment of the poetic work they’re discussing. In the classroom, “I love…” doesn’t start a fruitful conversation. It turned into a friendly little debate between poet and producer, writer and editor.

His pushback makes sense! And I needed to hear it. As a producer, I want to encourage the most unadulterated appreciation of poetry possible, to showcase a pure enjoyment that hopefully is so infectious that you, the listener, will send the episode to a friend.

Major showed me that if we don’t get elbows-deep into the why of our love, the function of our love, then our praises will fall flat. Because people connect and understand when you give them evidence, when you give them nuts and bolts, when you show them how the machine works. That not only helped me be a better editor of this podcast, it also helped me connect better with others on what drives them.

I keep today’s poem taped on my wall. I thought it spoke to me because it connects my father’s love of cars to my own love of poetry. But I realized, in writing this, that what it does on a craft level is what knocks me off my feet every time.

Lover of Cars
by Olivia Sokolowski

all those Stingers Jaguars Tiguans Fiat 500s
and San Remo Green Beemer i4s           I love all
those model numbers      numb-sexy           like cashmere
thrown over a dinosaur skeleton         like a robot’s
kiss I fell asleep watching an Audi documentary
and dreamt of a low       low R8 scorning the Via
del Corso          like a bronze falcon      but I love the prey
too      the hatchbacks perched high         on their haunches
like cats        with circular nervous energy            I want to wrap
my face tight with a silk scarf and spiral          down
             a Cinque Terre highway in an Alfa Romeo
the color of my innerlip          I want to slip deep as a splinter
in a black Countach        but that’s for when I graduate
            from Honda Girl            don’t get me wrong though—I love
hauling my Ridgeline through the car wash lather-disco
like a shy waltz partner while I blast Strauss          and in college
I used to hand-wash my red Element          I just           couldn’t stop
crawling on his roof and sudsing him head to taillight
              I even loved my first car            a black Civic driven
to slivers by my father’s second wife            my father’s
second wife who made yogurt       and kept gerbils
in a tiny cage          and hung clip-art fish shower curtains—
               mostly I felt sorry she was caught up in his swill
and cloudy blue windows            this is the kind of sad thing
one sees on foot        but from a car            you see one-winged
freewheeling vultures and Florida rabbits             with rat-sized
ears           and the highlighter-yellow post-tornado sky         you can even
see death          like the time my mom took an Ohio backroad
too fast and launched the Odyssey aloft       all four paws!
               it was great to be a little sick with fear but
               it’s better to be alive with a driver’s license        I adore
sliding down on a fabric seat and it smells like getting so
               far gone        I love being so so lonely on I-85             it feels
               like this:       when I get behind the wheel
I am my own father           but I am a good father            because
when I get behind the wheel      that car is my only wife

"Lover of Cars" by Olivia Sokolowski. Used by permission of the poet. Originally published in The Paris Review.