The Glimmering Room by Cynthia Cruz: First Impression & Poetry of Place

The Glimmering Room by Cynthia Cruz

“And us girls, with our pink plush
Unicorns, smashed on Paxil at the edge."

        – ‘Strange Gospels,’ p.17.

Associations can play an important role in the reader’s immediate impression to a writer’s creative work. At first, I did not like The Glimmering Room due to what I associated it with. The associations I had made these poems feel stale and ingenuine.

The juxtaposition of violence with pretty, girly things felt like it was just for the sake of it, almost like it was written with the ‘kinderwhore’ aesthetic (popularised by Courtney Love) in mind, and not much else. Girlhood, cake, ribbons, drugs, and so on… It almost lacked sincerity. Using a certain aesthetic/subculture for imagery or a theme in creative writing isn’t always a bad thing, in my opinion, but paired with the upsetting themes of eating disorders, child sex abuse, drug addictions, prostitution, etc. it initially bothered me and made it hard to read. Maybe that is my own sensitivity, as a reader, coming through.

My opinion changed when I read more about Cynthia Cruz and her poetics through an interview with The Rumpus. I realised that my initial impression had been premature. By looking at these poems with a different perspective – as poetry of place, or a type of social commentary, perhaps intertwined with the personal experiences of the poet – I found myself liking them more and more. 

The Glimmering Room subverts expectations in two ways:

1. The contrast of sweet, girly imagery with violence.
2. Presenting a side of California/America that people may not have thought of before, or want to think about. 

1       Pairing the cutesy, bubblegum-like images of childhood with dark themes is something that can shock and possibly alienate readers. I found myself alienated at first, but then I discovered that the imagery in The Glimmering Room helped push the core themes throughout the rest of the poems. It gives a sense of tragedy; that terrible things are happening to innocent young girls, when the most important thing happening in their lives should be getting an education, playing with friends, enjoying themselves – not being hooked on drugs, hospitalised, and exploited… 

Some people view California and the American Dream through rose-tinted glasses, especially people here in Europe who may not have been to America before. The vision can be like a sugar-coated fantasy – see Katy Perry’s song ‘California Gurls,’ as a perfect example of expectations for Californian life (along with Disneyland and the Silicon Valley). 

Cruz’s version of California is explored through the lens of a young girl trapped in an adult’s world, making it doubly as jarring to those that may not have considered the gritty realities of people who are living the complete reverse of the American Dream.