The Lantern Room

"The Lantern Room explores extreme psychic states alongside questions of what tethers us to the world, the seasons, and each other. With precision and compassion, these poems cut through the climate of silence surrounding mental illness and treatment. This collection is also concerned with the vigilance it takes for a woman to see herself and the world through her own gaze. Honum writes of sorrow and beauty, heartbreak and humor. By turns steely and delicate, these poems trace what it means to both stand trembling at precipices and to lean on wonder and beauty. "Lyrical and lush, Chloe Honum's The Lantern Room takes sorrow as its artistic subject: 'Alone in my bedroom, I sob, / and the wardrobe steps forward, / like a coffin-mother, to embrace me.' As Honum presents arresting imagery and daring metaphors, she does the urgent and necessary work of imagining a feminist poetics of the unspeakable, offering a vision that fully does justice to the complexity of her subject. 'Mother Silence / could appear behind me," she writes, "waving from any one of these dark windows.' The Lantern Room is a darkly brilliant book, and Honum is a rising star in contemporary poetry." - Kristina Marie Darling"--