Before getting too deep into Mortar, Sara Mumolo’s first poetry collection, you run into a familiar yet disarming question: what am I doing here?

Those who like to think of poetry as the purest expression of a unified self, in the tradition of lyric, should prepare to have their world upended by Karla Kelsey’s A Conjoined Book.

The Next Monsters is an accomplished volume, one that’s as carefully crafted as it is culturally astute. Her new collection is a wonderful addition to an already thought-provoking body of work.

Noel’s unwavering awareness is so keen and rapt that as it perceives it also exerts pressure on its object, and the image that returns to the gazer arrives metamorphosed. Just as metamorphic rock presents a record of its own creation, existence, and reinvention, Noel’s images and phrases come to us intensely acted upon, but elementally unharmed…

Loving engenders intimacy. The resulting proximity creates space for further loving. Lynn Xu’s song is born out of this space of intimacy.

Driven more by a simmering undercurrent of topic than form or principle of organization, these poems are frankly endearing in their fidelity to the lyric as an able expression of complex truths.

The Ecopoetry Anthology is a beautifully constructed, carefully planned, and intelligently framed volume. Readers looking for a concise introduction to the field of ecopoetry, or a thought-provoking intervention into contemporary scholarly approaches to ecopoetics, will find this book a worthy addition to their library.

Like all good poetry, Lost And keeps us somewhat lost, and therefore looking.