Parts That Were Once Whole
Nancy Botkin's poems are finely imagined, sharply realized, and exquisitely crafted.  Her particular strength is to transform moments of personal pain or confusion, often in the context of very ugly circumstances, into realizations of truth or beauty that transcend and heal the wounded psyche.  But there is nothing forced or didactic.  These realizations arise naturally through images that fuse subject and object into a new being. --Stephen MeatsThe dignity, clarity, and passion of Nancy Botkin's writing is at the heart of all great poetry, and to read her poems is to remember why we so love the art. To read these welcome poems is to feel refreshed and centered, to remember that "the only choice is to love the world." --Richard Jones