Marco Melfi, Routine Maintenance

reviewed by Alison McBain

Routine Maintenance

Author: Marco Melfi
Publisher: Gaspereau Press
Date: April 15, 2025
Length: 82 pages
ISBN: 1554472776, 978-1554472772

When I first moved to the Edmonton area of Alberta a couple of years ago, I joined the Stroll of Poets Society, and one of the first writers I met was Marco Melfi. He talked about working on his first collection of poetry, and I was very excited to hear that the book had come to fruition and was published earlier this year.

Having already heard Marco’s poetry live at in-person readings, I wasn’t surprised that I would so thoroughly enjoy his debut collection Routine Maintenance. The poems are beautiful and nostalgic, funny and profound in equal measures.

The collection opens with “My Grandfather Taught Me to Fish,” a memory that resonates with generational connections, and it ends on “Set Out At Six,” a walk through an urban landscape painted as a new and magical reality for the reader.

The unrhymed poems wander through the many permutations of the free verse form, sometimes with very short two- or three-line stanzas, sometimes in one longer block. The tone of the poems is both musical and practical, and the works themselves aren’t terribly lengthy; most don’t top a page, with a few veering into two-page territory.

The subject matter focuses on practical topics, but seen anew through imaginative whimsy: screen doors and junk drawers; the beauty and breaking down of buildings and their parts; playing — and failing at — soccer and hockey; the problems and upkeep of car ownership; and the landscape of the city of Edmonton.

I find this collection very personal, yet universal; a glimpse into the everyday, but examined with an eye both discerning and amused at the peculiarities of what we call “normal.” Sometimes, the poems take on the voice of commonplace objects: an alarm clock, a building’s sign, a furnace. One such example is “The Unlatchable Screen Door,” which reveals to the reader:

The house is hollow, slants, and I don’t
know whether I’m waiting

for new owners or a scrap metal collector.
So I swing, with or without a breeze,

and, like a neglected clock, tick
for ticking’s sake.

Each poem is a glimpse into ordinary moments made extraordinary through the grace of the poet’s vision. I’d highly recommend this collection to admirers of poetry, as well as to non-poetry readers looking to find a little extra magic brought into their daily experiences. In a literary market often suffused with explorations of suffering and pain, this collection was truly a breath of fresh air to read.