"Erudite—the word might be hurled at a poet as an insult, meant to suggest dull, arcane knowledge and lack of accessibility. In Strickland's case, however, erudite is a term of praise. For ideas and facts stud her poetry like so many gleaming jewels, yet they never tarnish the gold of human experience from which the poems are wrought. Take the trope of the title poem, for instance: beginning with the difference between magnetic and true north, Strickland launches into an exploration of the forces of love, until the metaphor links science and the heart so tightly that they are inseparable. Strickland's language is not easy; it is full of citations and allusions and sometimes dense with wordplay. But the force of her passion for ideas and for human connection sustains each poem." —Patricia Monaghan
“Strickland is a thrilling poet. She is a ‘rapt observer’ of shimmering worlds, in and out, and of the long story of human savagery, civility, and intelligence. She shines and dives across the air of many worlds. . . . Rooted in her sense of the profound voluptuous, she is a powerful ‘fabulist of what we are.’”—Marie Ponsot, author of The Bird Catcher
"In these poems specialized vocabularies—drawn from science, linguistics, history, mathematics—move in and out of each other in a radical remaking of language. The volume is a tour de force, and exhilarating to read." —The Women's Review of Books
