Chemo-Poet and Other Poems

“What is admirable about Davis’s poems is that true as she is to her experience (she is alternately angry, ashamed, sad, frightened), she never succumbs to self-pity. Her sense of humor, heart, and, of course, the poems themselves keep her afloat.” —Gardner McFall, *American Book Review* (January-March) “Davis gives us insight into a world we know, yet so rendered that our consciousness of it is that much deeper. The dream motif in several of these poems is so effectively incorporated that it seems we are inside the poems rather than simply observers: ‘There is always a clock in dreams,/ but my grandfather’s face points east,/ and we take the wineglasses and the Bible/ which says Whither thou goest out of the cabinet/ and start a prayer neither of us remembers.’ Painful and witty, these poems don’t weaken as the poet tries out a diversity of forms. Hers is a voice very different from that in most contemporary poetry, and it deserves to be heard.” —Lenard D. Moore, *Library Journal* (September 15, 1989)