Like the Singing Coming Off the Drums

Julia Chance

In all her words, Sanchez grabs your heart.
—Vibe

Library Journal

This collection of privately and publicly addressed love poems is targeted, one would guess, at the romantically inclined. And, yes, these poems fill the bill: one can imagine them being read in breathy sequence to an aroused and appreciative audience: "this is not a fire/ sale but I am in heat/ each time I see ya." Mostly adapted from Japanese forms like haiku and tanka, with a few longer poems addressed in homage to the late rapper Tupac Amaru Shakur, Cornel West, and others, they fail to showcase three of this poet's most potent strengths: economical storytelling; the ability to cut through to the heart of things with sharp-edged, non-sentimental descriptions of pain; and a concise and affecting use of rhyme. Occasionally, however, they do exhibit her gift for humor: "I wuz in Kansas/ dorothy and toto wuznt/ a jacuzzi, sky, you." -- Ellen Kaufman, Dewey Ballantine Law Library, New York

Library Journal

This collection of privately and publicly addressed love poems is targeted, one would guess, at the romantically inclined. And, yes, these poems fill the bill: one can imagine them being read in breathy sequence to an aroused and appreciative audience: "this is not a fire/ sale but I am in heat/ each time I see ya." Mostly adapted from Japanese forms like haiku and tanka, with a few longer poems addressed in homage to the late rapper Tupac Amaru Shakur, Cornel West, and others, they fail to showcase three of this poet's most potent strengths: economical storytelling; the ability to cut through to the heart of things with sharp-edged, non-sentimental descriptions of pain; and a concise and affecting use of rhyme. Occasionally, however, they do exhibit her gift for humor: "I wuz in Kansas/ dorothy and toto wuznt/ a jacuzzi, sky, you." -- Ellen Kaufman, Dewey Ballantine Law Library, New York

Julia Chance

In all her words, Sanchez grabs your heart. -- Vibe