Bob Hickoc's Insomnia Diary

Elizabeth Austin

Bob Hicok, Insomnia Diary

        Insomnia Diary focuses primarily on the seemingly ordinary moments in life that often go unacknowledged in any substantial sense. This is underlined by both the content of each individual poem and also the language Hicok utilizes: straightforward, uncomplicated vocabulary. His writing is clear in its meaning, but meandering in its syntax, which lends a wonderful puzzling quality to the poems. The perspectives were those of seemingly ordinary people, but made fresh by the knowledge that each individual perspective is, in fact, unique.

        In “Small purchase,” Hicok writes, “I often / forget whole parts of my parents’ lives / have nothing to do with me.” It’s a short statement amidst a sweet poem about driving with his father to buy lettuce from the grocer’s, but the impact is huge. The truth to that statement is universal. Most people do forget that their parents had lives before them, that they even had lives before each other, and that in relation to those parts of their lives, their children are irrelevant. Furthermore, often we forget that parents have their own lives separate from their children. The truth of this short declaration rung so true with me, and seemed to embody this hard-hitting truth that I found present in so much of this book, but delivered gently.

        The poems, “Dropping the euphemism” and “Calling him back from layoff” speak to one another, to latter following the former not just in the book but also in the real-time chronology of events. In the first poem, we see two positions that are seemingly in opposition: a boss firing an employee, watching him process the loss of his job. He writes from the boss’s perspective, “Just / by opening my mouth I destroyed / his faith he’s a man / who can think honey-glazed ham / and act out the thought / with plastic or bills.” The poem moves through their interaction, with the boss trying to absorb the small and telling changes in the employee’s demeanor, until finally at the end of the poem he writes, “I tried that later / with beer, it worked until I stood / at the toilet to make my little / waterfall, and thought of him / pushing back from a bar / to go make the same noise.” By the end of the poem the opposing positions we see at the beginning of the poem have found a common path. Furthermore, though it may seem odd, the overlapping of both men’s situations being joined by the natural act of going to the bathroom introduces again that element of basic humanity that Hicok threads throughout the book.

        The poem that follows is a complement to the first poem, wherein a boss calls an employee to offer them their job back. The poem is emotional and depressing, speaking to the tougher moments in life when things just aren’t going our way and there’s no hope of pulling through without a leg up. He writes, “He / was on the couch watching cars / painted with ads for Budweiser follow cars / painted with ads for Tide around an oval / that’s a metaphor for life because / most of us run out of gas and settle / for getting drunk in the stands / and shouting at someone in a t-shirt / we want kraut on our dog.” These lines show that although they are in different positions at the moment, the man calling to offer the job at least understands the mentality of the man he’s calling, knows what it is to be down on your luck and hopeless. There is a heavy conscientiousness throughout the poem, finally ending with the question: “and if I give a job to one stomach other / forks are naked and if tonight a steak / sizzles in his kitchen do the seven / other people staring at their phones / hear?” These lines hit home with so much force, we’ve seen the relief felt by the man on the phone, but the awareness of his boss at the end of the poem is where the real heart is. It raises, but does not answer the question of how much can we give to how many before we run out of resources and power, and how do we make those decisions?