Executive Overview
In contemporary American poetry, few pieces capture the friction between societal expectation and internal reality quite as sharply as Anna Drasko’s latest work. Selected as the Missouri Review Poem of the Week, Drasko’s poem “Maker” uses domestic debris, suburban wildlife, and the mundane decay of a neglected sourdough starter to explore larger themes of gender transition, bodily autonomy, and the inherent limits of language.
Drasko, an East Tennessee-based writer and alumnus of both the University of Pennsylvania and Penn State whose work has recently appeared in Chestnut Review, phoebe, and Good River Review, crafts a poetic landscape where nothing is pristine, yet everything is furiously alive. Set against a backdrop of invasive kudzu vines and highway noise, “Maker” moves effortlessly from the visceral mechanics of memory to a larger interrogation of selfhood.
This review examines the cultural and literary significance of “Maker,” exploring the intersection of Drasko’s personal background, the poem’s text, and an illuminating author’s note that reframes how we read identity in modern verse. Through close textual analysis and contextual framing, we unpack how Drasko moves beyond traditional tropes of domesticity to construct a new vernacular for genderless existence.
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Detailed Chronology & Genesis of the Work
From the Backcountry to the Page: The Setting of East Tennessee
The genesis of “Maker” is deeply rooted in the physical topography of East Tennessee, a landscape marked by striking contradictions. Living near a highway guardrail where invasive kudzu vines aggressively consume native flora by early summer, Drasko found inspiration in the resilient, chaotic ecosystem of their backyard.
Rather than a pastoral idyll, this environment is noisy, polluted, and crowded with unexpected life: highway traffic blurring past while groundhogs, hawks, deer, neighborhood dogs, and wild turkeys navigate the urban-rural fringe. It was within this specific ecology that the central imagery of the poem began to take root.
The timeline of the poem’s creation converges around two seemingly disparate domestic events:
- The Sourdough Abandonment: A neglected sourdough starter left in the back of a refrigerator for months, slowly accumulating colonies of pink, black, and green mold.
- The Turkey in the Tree: Witnessing a neighbor’s dog, Dolly, chase a wild turkey high into the branches of a tree—a revelation for a writer who previously assumed these heavy-bodied birds were incapable of sustained flight.
These two occurrences—one of slow, fungal decay and the other of sudden, surprising elevation—became the twin pillars upon which Drasko built “Maker.”
The Evolution of Gender and Domesticity
Crucially, the timeline of the poem aligns with a profound personal transition in Drasko’s life: the conscious departure from being perceived or identifying as a "woman." Drasko notes that the cessation of bread-making—signified by the rotting, multi-colored starter in the fridge—coincided precisely with stepping away from traditional gender roles.
For generations, cultural expectations have tethered femininity to domestic production, specifically the nurturing of others through food ("they like it when a woman makes something they can eat"). By allowing the sourdough starter to rot while simultaneously abandoning the social construct of womanhood, Drasko traces a parallel path of liberation from prescribed utility.
Textual Analysis: Deconstructing “Maker”
The Mouth, Memory, and the Materiality of Body
“Maker” opens with a striking, visceral declaration:
My mouth is a basket of tricks, I’ll chew
& spit before thinking better of it. Memory
announced itself mid gnash as the flesh
of a stale peanut thinned between
two or three teeth…
The mouth is immediately established not as a passive vessel for consumption or polite speech, but as an active, erratic agent—a "basket of tricks" prone to reckless expulsion. Memory does not arrive as a gentle, nostalgic reverie; it forces its way in "mid gnash," anchored to the physical sensation of a stale peanut. This tactile grounding sets the tone for a poem that consistently uses physical textures—dough stuck in fingernails, bubbling crust, glass-tipped leaves—to process abstract emotional states.
The Subversion of Domestic Labor
As the poem progresses, Drasko reflects on the performance of domesticity:
…and remember how I made
everyone believe making bread suited me,
they like it when a woman
makes something they can eat. She : )
is such : ) a great : ) baker : ).
The insertion of smiling emoticons (: )) within the poetic line is a brilliant formal choice, mimicking the performative, compulsory cheerfulness demanded of women in social and digital spaces. It highlights the artificiality of the praise heaped upon those who conform to domestic ideals. By rejecting the role of the baker, Drasko rejects the transactional nature of gendered labor.
The Grammatical Shift: Selfhood and Pronouns
Perhaps the most powerful moment in the poem occurs near its conclusion, where Drasko addresses the physical body and the limitations of language directly:
I have yet to solve
my body. No, it’s not solved,
- they’re not solved,
but magnified. Language is still
in the making, usually saying
more & less than its meaning.
This self-correction on the page—moving from "my body" to "it’s not solved" to the asterisks indicating the correction to "they’re not solved"—serves as a meta-textual monument to transition. The body is not a puzzle to be solved or fixed according to binary standards; rather, it is "magnified," complex, and ever-evolving.
In recognizing that language itself is "still in the making," Drasko acknowledges the inadequacy of existing vocabularies to fully capture non-binary or genderless experiences. Words, like bodies, constantly say "more & less than [their] meaning."
Supporting Context & Literary Metrics
The Contemporary Landscape of Non-Binary Poetry
Drasko’s work joins a vital, growing body of contemporary American literature by non-binary and transgender writers who are actively reshaping the poetic lexicon. Where earlier generations of queer literature often focused heavily on coming out or fighting systemic oppression, contemporary voices like Drasko, alongside poets published in venues like Chestnut Review and The Missouri Review, are increasingly turning their attention to the mundane, the ecological, and the bodily.
By grounding gender transition in the ecology of East Tennessee—among kudzu, wild garlic, stray dogs, and rotting sourdough—Drasko places queer survival within the broader rhythms of the natural world. Life "still unfolds" regardless of environmental toxicity or social pressure.
Publication and Critical Reception
The selection of “Maker” as The Missouri Review’s Poem of the Week underscores the growing institutional recognition of Drasko’s literary voice. With previous and forthcoming credits in prestigious literary journals, Drasko is rapidly establishing a reputation as a meticulous craftsman of verse who refuses easy resolutions.
| Metric / Detail | Description |
|---|---|
| Author | Anna Drasko |
| Education | University of Pennsylvania, Penn State |
| Current Residence | East Tennessee |
| Notable Publications | Chestnut Review, phoebe, Good River Review, The Missouri Review |
| Primary Themes | Gender transition, domestic subversion, ecological resilience, bodily autonomy |
Official Statements & Authorial Insight
In the official Author’s Note accompanying the poem, Drasko provides essential context regarding the environmental and psychological catalysts behind the work:
"This poem began in my backyard, where we share a guardrail with the highway, and the invasive kudzu vine suffocates every native plant by June. Amid the cars blurring by, I spend nights watching the turkeys, cats, hawks, groundhogs, the occasional deer, and my neighbors’ loose dogs. Despite the pollution, everything is so alive. No matter what the conditions, life still unfolds."
Drasko’s observation serves as a profound metaphor for queer existence in rural or marginalized spaces: life persists, adapts, and finds a way to reach the high branches of a tree, even when surrounded by the suffocating weight of social pollution and invasive pressures.
Reflecting on the intersection of baking, mold, and gender, Drasko adds:
"I enjoyed watching the mold multiply week after week in new colors as I stopped making bread around the same time I left being a ‘woman’ behind. It was an abandonment that felt right. This poem turned toward Ars Poetica as I pressed up against the limits of language, which happens often when I try to put words to my experiences of gender, or to anything."
This framing elevates "Maker" from a simple domestic vignette to a definitive Ars Poetica—a statement on the very nature of art-making, identity construction, and the ongoing struggle to find language that honors the complexity of a changing self.
Future Outlook
Anna Drasko’s emergence as a distinct and authoritative voice in contemporary poetry signals an exciting trajectory. As conversations around gender, identity, and regional literature continue to evolve, writers who can bridge the gap between gritty ecological reality and high lyricism will be vital to shaping our cultural understanding.
With degrees from elite institutions like the University of Pennsylvania and Penn State, paired with a fierce rootedness in the working landscapes of East Tennessee, Drasko possesses a unique dual perspective. Whether exploring the micro-politics of domestic kitchens or the macro-realities of non-binary embodiment, Drasko’s work demonstrates that language, like the body, is an ongoing project—one that is perpetually under construction, beautifully unresolved, and endlessly alive.
Readers and literary critics alike will undoubtedly keep a close watch on Drasko’s forthcoming publications, anticipating how this dynamic voice will continue to push the boundaries of modern verse.
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