October Mourning: A Song for Matthew Shepard (review)

A week after University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard was beaten and left for dead tied to a fence in Laramie, Wyoming in 1998, Newman arrived in town to give the keynote speech for the university's Gay Awareness Week. Over a decade later, she completed this cycle of poems, which offers poignant commentary on the tragedy. Verses explores various perspectives (including the attackers, police and attorneys, parents, and inanimate witnesses such as the fence and the stars) on the attack, the investigation and vigils, and the aftermath. Newman deploys a wide range of poetic forms, including pantoums, villanelles, haiku, and concrete poems, but all share jagged rhythms and a biting sense of grief and helplessness. While the writing quality dips at times, some poems are deeply emotional ("Their truck was the last thing he saw/ Tears fell from his unblinking eyes/ I cradled him just like a mother/ I held him all night long"). Extensive endnotes discuss the inspiration and factual referents for each poem, offer attributions for the epigraphs used throughout the book, and, when applicable, describe the poetic forms. Newman's informative preface and afterword and the appended list of resources make this an ideal choice to pair with Nelson's similarly elegiac A Wreath for Emmett Till (BCCB 4/05) for a provocative and heart-wrenching exploration of the human cost of hatred.