Hacker's Poetry is True to Form


All taxicabs should come alive
and stand on their back wheels and sing
that Iva Alyxander’s five!

The fish are burbling in the lake,
the bees are buzzing in their hive,
the candles flicker on the cake
that Iva Alyxander’s five!

As is the problem with rhymed or formal poetry, the true skill comes in making the form invisible. It is difficult to write lines where the rhymed words don’t seem forced into place, or where you have to scramble the natural sentence structure to make it “fit.” Some of these tricks are apparent in the selections from Hacker’s earlier books, but those tricks are not readily apparent in her later works. Hacker’s earlier works also have a tendency to reach into non sequitur to fit the rhymes and form.

Overall, I admire this collection for its showcasing of Hacker’s passion and skill. It has a great deal of depth and emotion, all while exhibiting the potential of the poetic form in the hands of a fantastic poet.

The copyright of the article Hacker's Poetry is True to Form in Poetry Book Reviews is owned by Bernadette Geyer. Permission to republish Hacker's Poetry is True to Form in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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