Some of the poems in Alix Perry’s collection Tomatoes Beverly flow beautifully, creating scenes in the mind’s eye. Others are somewhat disjointed and difficult to follow. This may be intentional; poetry is art, interpreted differently by the creator and the reader. Perry opens with a sage reminder for their readers: “Things I should know by now:/ whether to take the news with/ a grain of salt or a spoonful of sugar;/ when to lie and when to brag;/ how to celebrate anything at all. […] Breathe/ shallow to whisper, deeper/ to take blame./ Onerous is the task/
of feigned restraint.”
“gravity is/ the weight of all the stories we don’t know/ how to tell,” Perry tells us. Their method of immersing themselves in music for each separate piece is a brilliant idea: by fully allowing themselves to be influences by what they hear, Perry creates unique pieces that retain their own identity while subtlety uniting the collection as a whole.