over rule, by Deirdre Garr Johns

Poetry, chapbook, 40 pages, from Bottlecap Features.

Playing by the rules is safe, expected. But who makes the rules — and what happens when we challenge or break them?

Deirdre Garr Johns’ poetry collection over rule opens with a series of poems that frame larger social issues faced by women and the demands to “be quiet” / “talk more” / "lighten up”; the unwanted attention from men that means “no harm”; the advice “not to wear a ponytail” when out for a run; and labels that become “tape / across the mouth.”

Later poems in over rule include allusions that highlight the complex nature between internal and external conflicts defining a woman’s role. We are meant to believe that “those who stray” from social expectations will “gather Ophelia’s garland.”⁠ Years of following rules dictated by others come to a crossroads. How long will we silently accept the spoken and unspoken rules that shape how we live our lives?

The final poems capture a voice altered by action and retrospection, giving permission to “wear the bare, / the cracked // bones of living // bones of her / own rib.”

Garr Johns’ over rule is more than a woman’s experience — it invites readers to look at the ways in which social norms have framed our collected lives. And perhaps, give courage to people to live by their own rules.