Round 14

Yusef: "Skin" by Susan Dickman

Bob: "Traced Red Dot" by Clark Coolidge

Dickman's poem is truly memorable. What happens to the skin floating around after a terrorist bombing? "What to do / with all the minute pieces, the shreds?" The ending ruins the poem for me, by finding a false resolution of this question: "perhaps / somehow, the earth remembers." And then a little note: "Jerusalem Bombing, February 1996."

Contrasted with Coolidge's skin imagery: "skin pulling its surface moisture / Barbizon personality like a peanut."

I can't give the outright victory to Coolidge, even though he's obviously one of my favorite poets. The poems are just too different from each other: no punches were thrown in this finger-puppet fight so I have to call it a draw.

Score after 14:

3-8-3