Susana H. Case’s MATINÉE GIRLS, Broadstone Books 2026, Franklin, KY
80 pages; ISBN: 978-1-966677-58-1; Price $25
Prize-winning poet Susana Case’s latest book of poetry, Matinée Girls, continues the poet’s journey, set forth in her previous nine books, in which she explores themes of coming-of-age, love, sex, war, race relations, travel and the general atmosphere of the 60s in the U.S. in lyrics that leave us with nostalgia for the impetuousness of youth and the melancholy of ageing. But the poet does so in witty and buoyant poems.
From the first poem in the book, Barcelona, we know we are in the hands of a talented writer with an eye for detail and the ability to create interesting images with simple observations such as:
“Did I tell you the shirt I couldn’t
buy had little squiggles that were
the color of your eyes?”
This slight observation indicates both a sharp eye and an ability to bring together disparate images in a novel and arresting way. As for word choice, when is the last time you used the word “squiggles”? In this case it is perfect. The poem also foreshadows some of the themes that are explored in greater depth in the book, including travel, love, longing, even politics as the speaker witnesses the Spanish police rounding up
“…Senegalese and Southeast Asian
immigrants selling handbags…”
In Case’s poetry there is often a subtext that ties the poems together. In this book the intertextual device juxtaposes commentary inspired by liner notes from the Beatles’ The White Album with Case’s witty narrative poems. Riffing on the song Happiness is a Warm Gun, the poet writes…
“The BBC and American censors were incensed at the doo-woppy bang bang, shoot shoot, the implicit sex and “I need a fix” lyrics…This was my favorite track on the album. I loved that it was theirs.”
There is much nostalgia in this collection regarding youth, high school, a first kiss, dancing The Twist, practicing walking in high heels. However, not all is sunshine and rainbows (although the collection does contain a rainbow “painted on the tunnel to Marin County…”. The poet explores the “sorry state of race relations in the U.S.”, rape, the Tate murders and the war in Vietnam among other subjects less cheerful than high school dances. Susana Case, now retired from teaching at New York Institute of Technology brings us back to the good old/bad-old days. Back when smoking was considered cool before we knew how deadly it (and other things we considered cool) could be. And she does it with felicity and elan.
The ironic title of her poem, “On the Way to My Class in Primate Ecology,” foreshadows a creepy experience she has on 8th Street in New York. A stranger…
“…wants to take me
to his studio to photograph me.”
But the poet’s good sense and a New York woman’s guarded suspicion gives her pause.
“…his face is a yes
but handsome Ted Bundy
just got nicked
for the murder of another one,
so no go…
His fingernails are dirty.
I don’t see any camera.”
Even in such a dark poem Case’s wit comes through.
Throughout Matinee Girls Susana Case demonstrates an acute understanding of human beings and their various idiosyncrasies.
One of the most effective (among many) of the poems in this collection occurs toward the end of the book when the poet reflects on the chance meeting of an old acquaintance on Central Park South in New York. The poem captures some of the major themes of the collection: wild youth, the stifling of spontaneity and passion in maturity, nostalgia, and finally the inability to connect with a long-lost past. It narrates the story of a young friend who “drunk on table wine”…
“…mercy-fucked
A one-armed man in Brindisi,
thus doing a good deed for mankind…”
The poet cannot “find that girl in this woman…” Like one’s inability to recognize the faces of former classmates at a reunion.
“And then, and then…what else
is there to say about the after—”
All there is to do is remember, and to wonder what happened to that one-armed man, which is to say what happened to us as we were back then.
Susana Case concludes this dazzling collection on this note.
“…when I murmur no one else knows me like you, that does
not mean you know anything at all.”
Coming away from this collection we might think we know much more about Susana Case as a poet than we did before reading her. In fact, we do. Perhaps not all, but enough to want to read more of this brilliant poet.
Jonathan Harrington
Mérida, México
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Susana H. Case is the author of ten books of poetry, most recently, Matinée Girls (Broadstone Books, 2026). She is co-editor with Margo Taft Stever of I Wanna Be Loved by You: Poems on Marilyn Monroe (Milk & Cake Press, 2022), Honorable Mention for the Eric Hoffer Book Award, and with Margo Taft Stever and Sandra Yannone of Unsinkable: Poetry Inspired by the Titanic (Salmon Poetry, 2026). The Scottish Café (Slapering Hol Press, 2002) was re-released in English/Polish as Kawiarnia Szkocka (Opole University Press, 2010) and in English/Ukrainian as Шотландська Кав’ярня (Slapering Hol Press, 2024). https://susanahcase.com
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Reviewer Jonathan Harrington’s latest book is The Frozen Sea Within Us (New and Selected Poems). In addition to twenty books (novels, essays, short stories and poetry), Jonathan has published reviews and other non-fiction in everything from the New York Times to Metro Magazine. He received a M.F.A. from the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop in 1983. He has published translations of poems by various poets writing in the Maya language. His translation of Feliciano Sanchez Chan’s book, Seven Dreams appeared from New Native Press and was nominated for eight translation awards. Jonathan has lived in Yucatán, México for 26 years.
