Sherman Alexie discusses many things in his poem, “Crazy Horse Boulevard” such as how many best friends his brother has had and lost, his meaning of the loneliest number, and how much love he has for his brother. He also discusses the greatest human beings he knows that have ever lived, ironies, and his many drafts. What draws me to “Crazy Horse Boulevard” is how different it is from other poems that I have read in the past. For example, the language in this poem is unique because it does not have any form of rhyme and it is divided into six different sections; however, it is considered a single poem that is free verse. While looking over his poem for the second time I read something that I had not noticed before. I realized that in each section he always …show more content…
Even his exploration of the largest number, six, is done in a way that reveals his brothers’ profound loneliness. Alexie begins the poem with extreme loneliness and ends it with it as well by letting us know that his brother has carried five coffins in his lifetime and “though he may not admit it, fully expects to bury his sixth best friend in the very near future” (124-125). He also shows the exploration of the numbers one through six indirectly. He does this by repetition or by naming certain things that eventually add up to a specific number. For example, in section three Alexie says, “I love my big brother” (48-49) repeatedly until he has said it at least five times. Another example of him counting indirectly would be in section six where Alexie says, “My big brother’s trinity beer, pizza, and death songs” (133) when he says this he mentions three things that represent his brother. Alexie continues to count indirectly throughout the whole poem in all six sections to provide different examples of loneliness and to make us realize that one is not the loneliest number, rather it is every other number but,