\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"An exquisite storyteller.\"\u0026#151;\u003cI\u003eThe Southern Review\u003c/I\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"David Bottoms's poems just get better and better.\"\u0026#151;\u003cI\u003eThe Atlanta Journal-Constitution\u003c/I\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"One finds here what one expects in a book of good Southern poems: clear narratives . . . evocative images, searching irony, and meditative poise.\" \u0026#151;\u003cI\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c/I\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRooted in the customs of Southern families and peopled with undertakers, bluegrass musicians, daughters practicing karate, and elderly parents, David Bottoms' poems are generous, insightful, and lean headlong into familial wisdom. Past and present interweave with grandmothers spitting tobacco juice, ponds \"filled with construction runoff,\" and the boyhood home-site paved over for a KFC. This is Bottoms' most personal and heartbreaking book.\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cB\u003eFrom \"My Daughter Works the Heavy Bag\":\u003c/B\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cI\u003eA bow to the instructor,\u003cBR\u003ethen fighting stance, and the only girl in karate class faces the heavy bag.\u003cBR\u003eSmall for fifth grade\u0026#151;willow-like, says her mother\u0026#151;\u003cBR\u003esweaty hair tangled like blown willow branches.\u003cBR\u003e\u003cBR\u003eThe boys try to ignore her. They fidget against the wall, smirk,\u003cBR\u003epractice their routine of huff and feint.\u003cBR\u003eCircle, barks the instructor,\u003cBR\u003ejab, circle, kick, and the black bag wobbles on its chain.\u003cBR\u003e\u003cBR\u003eAgain and again, the bony jewels of her fist\u003cBR\u003ejab out in glistening precision,\u003cBR\u003eher flawless legs remember arabesque and glissade.\u003cBR\u003eKick, jab, kick, and the bag coughs rhythmically from its gut.\u003cBR\u003e\u003cBR\u003eThe boys fidget and wait . . . \u003c/I\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cB\u003eDavid Bottom\u003c/B\u003e, Georgia's Poet Laureate, was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame in 2009. He teaches at Georgia State University and co-edits \u003cI\u003eFive Points \u003c/I\u003emagazine. He lives in Marietta, Georgia.\u003c/p\u003e\u003c/div\u003e
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