Match Cut

In Letitia Trent's latest collection, her poems weave wraith-like through the breaths between cuts, lingering in spaces often left offscreen. The work approaches deified films from the perspective of women, framing lost and forgotten voices against the overpowering mythos of the auteur. Match Cut cherishes its cinematic muses as much it critiques them. It doesn't burn down; it creates space for women and femmes to respond to scenes and characters created by men. Trent's collection emphasizes the limitations of the male gaze and the way women are often reduced to tropes. In "Blue Velvet" Trent says, "with every pan, / every match cut / that when it comes to women, // there are really only two--" The narrators living in these pages don't wait for their directors to call on them. They shape their own stories, fleshing out tales we love with the voices they've always been missing. Trent's verses often dwell in dark places, but their existence is an act of deliverance.