from 2025 post in ModPo

When Armantrout wrote “Freeze Tag,” it was after 9/11, a time of war talk, fear, and pressure to keep buying as a way of showing “patriotism” as part of a culture that encouraged shopping as reassurance. People worried about poisons in the air, in food, in clothes. Her poem shows how this culture of buying and waste seeps into our lives, possibly affecting people’s health in body and spirit, and leaving us stuck in an inescapable loop.

Perhaps, if she were writing today, in a time when leaders call for silencing comedians, rivals, or anyone who disagrees, she would likely point to how the language of “freedom” or “cancel culture” gets twisted. She would show how everyday things—ads, slogans, even holidays—hide the poisons of control and fear beneath their ostentatious surface.