From Alexandria Quarterly Press, Barbara Hill’s moving collection of poems. Though literary culture often celebrates the up-and-coming voices of the young, here we have Barbara Hill’s debut, a collection reflecting nearly seven decades of careful observation, deep experience, and, ultimately, wisdom. In these poems, she calls to relations long gone as well as the ‘daughter who questions / everything I say.’ A calico in winter becomes ‘a cat / inside a dress of ice, ’ while among the squash blossoms in a kinder season ‘the honeybees, sleek and quick / are architects.’ She writes, ‘You are your own watchful neighbor, / living always beside yourself’ and that she is: a person present to the daily world, a poet able to render what she sees down to the most evocative details. Barbara Hill’s A Few Sharp and Glamorous Words shows the power and beauty that can come from taking your time. Jessica Jacobs, author of Take Me With You, Wherever You’re Going