Book Review: The Oracles of Our Stars

Title: The Oracles of Our Stars 

Author: Serge Elie Seropian

Date: 2020

Publisher: Serge Elie Seropian

ISBN: 978-1-7771404-1-0

Quote: "Love is not blind / When it sees all / And yet loves anyway." 

I don't know how old Serge Elie Seropian was when he wrote these poems. I didn't know how old Tanya Mills was when she wrote Worthless, either...I'm not trying to trigger another adolescent emotional outburst here, but those two books have much in common and could be read as companion books. Both are in-depth studies of the "broken hearts" of very young people, very talented, sensitive, insightful, well-intentioned, but losing the game of Romantic Love. 

Both really are the kind of thing that should be written when one is nineteen and aching with frustrated passion, then dug out, polished up, and published as a cautionary study when one is old enough to laugh at one's mistakes.

Poetry tends to appeal to the young so no aunt could possibly proceed any further with a review of The Oracles of Our Stars without a bit of the kind of preaching that so upset Mills. I'm sorry, Seropian. This is absolutely required by the laws of aunthood:

Before going to college, or even going out on a date without a parent driving the car and waiting outside the hosts' front door, every girl should be warned about guys like the narrators of Seropian's romantic poems. They say lovely things about their spiritual love and friendship and admiration and so on and so on. If you take these things seriously and spend nights with them, inevitably it will become "impossible for [the two of you] to be together" and at best, if very lucky, you'll receive letters about their broken hearts written from the faraway places they go. More likely you'll be bitterly blamed and shamed for whatever flaws they can remember or invent; one of Seropian's poems describes the girl as "a free spirit," but non-poets usually have non-poetic names for it--the important thing is that it's usually not true. Sometimes the motive for leaving is to take advantage of real jobs or scholarships, too, but mostly it's to get away from you. And the baby they're afraid you might have. And the disease they may not want to know they've shared with you. Guys really do not want to think about the fact that contact with a harmless little wart they don't see as a serious disfigurement can cause a particularly insidious, asymptomatic, deadly form of cancer in women. 

If you are a young woman you need to condition yourself, any time a young man mentions spending a night together before the wedding, to think "cancer." After that you can still spend nights, as it might be at the homes of relatives, close enough together to find out what interesting people are like when they're at home, as long as you don't do anything that could cause cancer.

("But I wouldn't cause cancer!" guys will scream, if you set good clear boundaries. "I'm a very special snowflake! You're a horrible person for even thinking that I would ever..." If they even start telling you what a horrible person you are, for saying no or for anything else, the essential thing for a girl to remember is to move on to the next. If they confine themselves to the claim that they are very special snowflakes, they may actually be special, but let them melt a little just to find out. And don't do anything that could cause cancer, or pregnancy, anyway.)

Spiritual love and friendship and admiration between young unmarried people are beautiful things, and should never be sullied by carnalities like prolonged hand-shaking. One quick shake on the way back from a college Cultural Enrichment Event is enough. 

There is not enough attention to the concept of "enough" in The Oracles of Our Stars, though there is some apparently belated romantic renunciation. There is no mention of all of the way courtship, in which a man proves his worth as a provider and protector, starts by protecting a woman from even having to ruin a moment by saying no to anything that could cause cancer or pregnancy. There is also a noticeable lack of attention to the love of brothers, sisters, parents, or family generally. There is only one poem about the love of country, although it's one of the best in the book. There are some good poems about the love of friends, the love of humanity, and the love of God.

The country Seropian's speaker loves, in this book, is Lebanon, which the speaker wants to see "arise with love in [its collective] heart." In the case of war-torn Lebanon it's easy to interpret this phrase as "put the senseless civil war behind us." The value of meditating on what this phrase might mean for other countries or communities is probably worth the price of the book.

Lebanon was the home of Khalil Gibran, world-famous for his poetry collection The Prophet. Reading Oracles brings The Prophet to mind; I suspect this was intended. Rhythm and rhyme occasionally happen, but seem to be tolerated rather than sought after. Lines may or may not be end-stopped. The English is fluent but neither British nor American. The topics, the lack of differentiation among the kinds of love considered...Many of my generation liked The Prophet and may be interested in reading the work of a contemporary admirer of that classic book. For us it's safe. We're past temptation by the misguided romantic poems ("if you are not insane you are not in love") and prepared to appreciate the reflections on the love of humankind.

"[L]ove is its own poet

And its nature is its mystery."

"And what is the great love but the shadow of God's love for you?"

"It's the most confident ones

that are the most broken."

Seropian still sounds young, but his insights on these topics are worth consideration.