LJ Sysko’s collection The Daughter of Man, a finalist for the 2023 Miller Williams Poetry Prize, has been reviewed in the Colorado Review.
“The varied jewels of Sysko’s hoard make this book worth reading. These poems have wonderfully glib titles like ‘What’s stupid’ and ‘The Yassification of Dolly Parton.’ (I have to admit that, upon reading the latter for the first time, I yelped with excitement.) They’re sometimes marked by subtle internal and end rhyme (‘. . . laughing so hard / only he can hear. Rings mark the years’). There’s a close reading and unpacking of the acronym ‘M.I.L.F.’: ‘The M’s self-explanatory. / The I / is a boy-man’s first-person perspective…’ It’s worth noting, though, that these sugary pleasures of sound and humor don’t preclude gravity; within the sweetness, Sysko addresses such topics of as her Jewish grandparents’ escape from Germany (as in ‘Kristallnacht’) and sexual assault (as in ‘Date Rape’). Power and control drive this book, and particularly the weight of misogyny looms over it all, providing a veil through which Sysko can pierce, giving readers something to root for.”
—Ellie Black, Colorado Review, November 2023
Read the full review at the Colorado Review.
The Daughter of Man follows its unorthodox heroine as she transforms from maiden to warrior—then to queen, maven, and crone—against the backdrop of suburban America from the 1980s to today. In this bold reframing of the hero’s journey, L. J. Sysko serves up biting social commentary and humorous, unsparing self-critique while enlisting an eccentric cast that includes Betsy Ross as sex worker, Dolly Parton as raptor, and a bemused MILF who exchanges glances with a young man at a gas station. Sysko’s revisions of René Magritte’s modernist icon The Son of Man and the paintings of baroque artist Artemisia Gentileschi, whose extraordinary talent was nearly eclipsed after she took her rapist to trial, loom large in this multifaceted portrait of womanhood. With uncommon force, The Daughter of Man confronts misogyny and violence, even as it bursts with nostalgia, lust, and poignant humor.
L. J. Sysko is the author of the chapbook Battledore. Her work has appeared in Ploughshares, Best New Poets, and elsewhere. She lives in Delaware.