Sweet/Crude: A Bakken Boom Cycle by Heidi Czerwiec
Gazing Grain Press, 2016
Delicately dancing the line between academic and creative writing, Heidi Czerwiec’s Sweet/Crude: A Bakken Boom Cycle is a timely challenge to myriad institutions. In her chapbook, Czerwiec explores the oil boom in western North Dakota and parts of Montana, specifically the Bakken region, with beautifully woven, lyrical prose.
The cover is a piece by John Pepion that shows a bare-bodied Native American woman holding her face, an oilrig with flames and smoke coming out of it, and three identical, tiny houses, all set in front of a ledger with “Cash” at the top for the background. The cover speaks of the words held within. The individual image of the exploited Native American woman is representative of those who are sold and transported against their will to be abused by oil workers, the oilrig’s fire shows chaos and the lightning-fast changes that a boom entails, the smoke hints at the ecological disaster in the Bakken region, and the identical, cramped houses represent the living conditions of those working in the region.
The form of the chapbook hints at the tension of the oil boom, balancing the academic material with poetic language. Czerwiec credits two University of North Dakota professors, Bill Caraher and Bret Weber, for providing the research necessary for her to write a piece that is grounded in collections of data as well as individual experience.
The central tension of the chapbook is between the individual and the institutions around them. Czerwiec compassionately describes the human experience of the oil boom—the cramped quarters, the stolen sisters, the fractured families—while addressing the oil companies, the state’s inability to provide resources and regulations, and the poverty-crippled towns. Through the tension between the individual and the institution, Czerwiec humanizes a social, environmental, and political disaster while exhorting readers to examine their participation in systems that cause harm.
The phrase “What lies beneath you?” appears throughout, binding the two sides of the tension together. There is the obvious answer: the land lies beneath and the oil beneath that, but it is a further challenge to explore what the reader finds beneath. While oil companies found oil beneath the land, the reader finds systems of exploitation of women, the land, and choice-deprived workers beneath the text of Czerwiec’s chapbook.
Sweet/Crude does not blame; it is an exploration of something more complex. The anger is conflated with sympathy, and the bitter moments are entwined with tenderness. Czerwiec balances apparent contradictions to paint an incredibly complete image of the oil boom in a short and moving read. In light of the controversies that surround oil drilling in America, Czerwiec’s thoughtful, caring, and clear-eyed Sweet/Crude is a chapbook for those concerned about the implications of oil booms.
Benjamin Stallings is a literature student in Southeast Tennessee at Lee University, where he hopes to become a better reader and writer. He has lived most of his life in Beijing, China, but has recently settled into his American heritage and home.