Thornwork

I know as much as I know, ' Baumann writes, 'and still get out of bed.' And what trauma survivor has not marveled at this exact triumph? THORNWORK is a rigorous examination of the abundant hunger of both body and psyche to survive. This generous work confronts our inadequacies: 'We have tried you, language, but you have not been enough, ' and nurtures even our most imperceptible efforts: 'I have almost enough courage to keep walking myself home, ' offering a realistic portrait of the untidy endeavor to persevere."--Jeanann Verlee

"THORNWORK sings to the soft sleeping animal at the center of us all, and shows us that to love wrongly is still to love. It's a eulogy for the former self, a prayer, a ghost story. This is an urgent, spell-binding book." --Meg Freitag

"Ruth Baumann's THORNWORK is painted with vertiginous desires, 'I wake up how a thief wakes up, one want at a time.' These poems explore what happens when we harm for or are harmed by that which we desire--'god is not a pitcher plant / It's us humans that eat each other.' Baumann leads us into a world that is both familiar and foggy, both lonely and suffocating, a world where 'Life fidgets everywhere.' It isn't Baumann's job to lead us back out--she is here to tell us what's at stake, she is here to show us the 'new angles.' Come in and have a look around. 'Make a sudden noise. See which animals in us come out.'"--Paige Lewis