THE MIRACLE OF MERCURY by Joan Hanna

$12.49

 

Joan Hanna’s poems may be “mercurial” in their beguiling shifts of tone, but they also reveal a surprising stability. I mean that, despite the dangerous territory that Hanna plumbs here—stories of familial conflict, as well as the ravages of recent American history—still, these are the poems of a survivor, and they offer their reader the reliable, sustaining pleasure of hard-won and well-made art. I’m certain that we will be reading poems such as “Tile and Stone,” “Rick,” and “Glass” for a long time to come.

–Peter Campion author of Other People, Lions and El Dorado

 

Joan Hanna dances with danger. Her words scorch the page as she explores memory through the elements—fire, water, air—and woos their magic as they woo those who dare tempt the fates. In one moment, mesmerizing beauty. In another, poison permeates from magnificence. In The Miracle of Mercury, Hanna touches the stove not to see if it is hot but to feel how it burns the flesh. These poems are dangerous in their beauty, haunting in their execution. Hanna embraces their miracles and their madness with an equal, attentive eye.
–Lori A. May, author of Square Fee

 

Mercury as an element is poisonous, free flowing, fascinating and beautiful; both freezing and burning with the same touch. As mercury changes shape with shifts in temperature, so the poems in The Miracle of Mercury elude, allude and tease language as easily as a child cracking open a thermometer attempting to touch her own mortality without pulling back. These poems are about the delicious power of dangerous objects and surviving amid a chasm that cannot be understood.

–Millicent Borges Accardi Author of Woman on a Shaky Bridge and Injuring Eternity
Category:

Description

THE MIRACLE OF MERCURY

by Joan Hanna

paper

$12.49

(2016)

Joan Hanna was born and raised in Philadelphia and now lives in New Jersey with her husband, Craig. When not procrastinating on social media Joan writes poetry, nonfiction, and fiction. She also writes a pretty good review and likes to ask tough questions in interviews, which she is convinced is going to turn back around on her one of these days.

Her current editorial passions are: Assistant Editor, Nonfiction/Poetry for r.kv.r.y. Quarterly Literary Journal, Assistant Managing Editor of River Teeth, A Journal of Nonfiction Narrative and former Managing Editor for Poets’ Quarterly.

Joan’s poems have appeared in The Ohio Poetry Association’s publication, Common Threads, the inaugural issue (online and print versions) of Rowan University’s publication, Glassworks, the 15th Annual Poetry Ink Anthology and in the Stand, Speak, Empower pamphlet for Sexual and Domestic Violence Awareness published by The Center for Family Services and SERV (Services Empowering the Right of Victims) April 2011.

Her nonfiction story, Breathing, appeared in the Shorts on Survival section in the October 2010 issue of r.kv.r.y.

Joan’s book reviews and interviews have appeared at r.kv.r.y. Quarterly Literary Journal, Author Exposure, The Ashland University MFA Blog and Poets’ Quarterly.

She is currently expanding her short, Burn, into a novel and looking for a publisher for her full-length poetry manuscript that, like a true unruly child, doesn’t seem to like any of its assigned names.

Joan is an Adjunct Professor of Creative Writing at Rowan University and holds an MFA in Creative Writing, Poetry and Creative Nonfiction from Ashland University in Ohio.

 

Reviews

There are no reviews yet.

Be the first to review “THE MIRACLE OF MERCURY by Joan Hanna”

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related products