Instructions for Waking By Jennifer A. Hartenburg. Kelsay Books, 2026. Paperback, 70 pages, $20. Reviewed by Matt Miller. I’m not much of a birdwatcher. We keep a few feeders, and I’m always pleased to spot a bald eagle, a pileated woodpecker, or a Baltimore oriole....
American Independence in Verse By Bradford Skow. Pentameter Press, 2025. Paperback, 94 pages, $9.99. Reviewed by Thomas Philbrick. In Book III of the Aeneid, Aeneas lands with his men on the shores of Carthage after fleeing Troy and surviving a string of harrowing...
Pastorals By Rachel Hadas. Measure Press, 2025. Hardcover, 88 pages, $25. Reviewed by Midge Goldberg. What are Rachel Hadas’s pastorals? Not poems, not essays, not quite prose poems. What they really feel like are “visits.” You go to a friend’s house, sit down in the...
Killing Orpheus By Forester McClatchey. Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2026. Paperback, 88 pages, $20. Reviewed by Camilo Peralta. Might a revival of our degraded culture, or at least its verse, be possible? A recent collection titled Killing Orpheus from Forester...
Awake! William Blake and the Power of the Imagination By Mark Vernon Hurst, 2025. Hardcover, 312 pages, $37.99. Reviewed by Paul Krause. William Blake’s name is synonymous with mad genius. In his time, as in ours, he had a reputation for being a crazy...
To Find Eyes to See
@NadyaWilliams81 on "More Than a Matter of Taste: The Moral Imagination and the Spirit of Literature" by Joshua Hren. @WordOnFire Luminor
Rural America as It Really Is
Jason C. Phillips on "Faith, Family, and Flag: Branson Entertainment and the Idea of America" by Joanna Dee Das. @UChicagoPress
