How do we move forward after enormous loss? Perhaps like the lightning-struck tree, "half of it shorn of leaves the other half full, standing, / swaying...." In these beautiful, intimate poems spoken from the heart of grief, the speaker urges herself not to flinch, "letting the knife settle where it will, / blade nestled between a rib and a rib." Life and death go hand and hand here, and the natural world that consoles is also a constant reminder of our own mortality. Because Clark is a terrific poet, she can also make something true and moving "out of cold air...with lamenting words...an invigorating, heel-kicking tune."

--Sharon Bryan, Sharp Stars