Haunts

From Jennifer L. Knox, author of Drunk by Noon & The Mystery of the Hidden Driveway: Some poets take a lot of time mucking up the surface of their poems, turning on the smoke machine, draping silk scarves over the lamps, etc. They don't want to be too clear. The poems in Haunts are crystal clear, but that doesn't help you see what's coming. Every turn is a surprise in this funny, wicked smart, tightly-crafted book. Laura Cherry makes me happy to be a poet. From Adam Clay, author of A Hotel Lobby at the Edge of the World: The "perfect symmetry" of the cars on a bridge - symmetry in Cherry's work occurs not in nature, but in human life. A flock of birds takes off "on schedule" and the speaker thinks of a "luminous plane." Cherry even has the gall to take on the odes (and the ghost) of John Keats. In each reading of this book, a new image or idea catches me. Each time I pick it up, I can't wait to find out what's next.