"Williams and Dickinson together taught Armantrout how to dismantle and reassemble the forms of stanzaic lyric... how to embody large questions and apprehensions in the conjunctions of individual words, how to generate productive clashes from the arrangements of small groups of phrases. From these techniques, Armantrout has become one of the most recognizable, and one of the best, poets of her generation."--Boston Review

"In every line, every stanza of these brief and dense poems, Rae Armantrout's powerful mix of scientific inquiry and social commentary, wit and strangeness, is profoundly stimulating. She changes the way one sees the world and hears language--every poem an explosion on the page in which her individuality shines through. Is the work funny? Absolutely. Moving? Yes. But beware--after reading Armantrout you will question everything, including what it means to be funny and moving."--Lydia Davis, author of Samuel Johnson is Indignant

"In every line, every stanza of these brief and dense poems, Rae Armantrout's powerful mix of scientific inquiry and social commentary, wit and strangeness, is profoundly stimulating. She changes the way one sees the world and hears language--every poem an explosion on the page in which her individuality shines through. Is the work funny? Absolutely. Moving? Yes. But beware--after reading Armantrout you will question everything, including what it means to be funny and moving."--Lydia Davis, author of Samuel Johnson is Indignant

"The poems in Armantrout's new collection are edgy, idiosyncratic, tough, and tender."--Susan Howe, author of The Midnight, Singularities, The Birth-mark