Praise for The Rape Poems, by Frances Driscoll:

Lynn Emanuel: "It is impossible to praise this book too much--its power, maturity, sorrow, and fierce resistance. This book should be required reading in America."

Gillian Conoley: "These are stunning poems, in every sense of the word. Tracing the circuitous and torturous paths of memory, Frances Driscoll fearlessly looks back on, and into, rape. Her triumph is that she refuses to trivialize through a mode of confessionalism. Instead, these are poems that are lush with a common, familiar, evocative language that cuts through the surface detritus of our lives, the 'pastel drugs' of therapy, the police reports, the 'cheap filler' of the national wire. What she ultimately reveals are the beauty and terror of what she hesitantly calls 'real life.' These are poems of great courage. And if these are poems of terror, they are also poems of beauty, as Frances Driscoll takes us to a place finally colored by the 'lemon-green of very young leaves.'"

Nikki Giovanni: "Powerful. Sad. Touching. Sad. Inspiring. Sad. What a gift she has."

Ralph Angel: "Not since the Beats has reportage been employed without the slightest pretension. Harrowing and obsessively skeptical, tender and private and hugely humane, these unsettling poems arrive like dispatches from the very source of our wounds."

Paul Mariani: "Frances Driscoll's The Rape Poems is a deeply disturbing, compelling and somehow beautifully rendered sequence of poems, in which a terrible wounding has been transformed by long meditation, careful attention to detail, and superb artistry. Though hers is a landscape one would think would be strewn with the landmines of sentimentality and self-pity, there is never a false step here as she guides us through her nightmare. Of how many books of poetry can one truly say, 'I could not put this book down until I'd read it through to the end'? This is one of those rare books."

David St. John: "In this psychologically searing collection of poems, Frances Driscoll is wise, clear-eyed, and unrelenting. As her readers, we're asked to attempt a reckoning with an act and experience of violence so intimate it rips the fabric of an entire life. The poet asks not only if one can ever triumph over the pain and psychic debris of such an event, but also if this isn't perhaps, what it can truly mean--the terror, the misappraisals of family and friends--to be a woman in America today."

Frances Driscoll's poems have appeared in International Quarterly, The Massachusetts Review, Negative Capability, Ploughshares, Sojourner, 13th Moon, Volt, and Willow Springs, among other places. "Island Of The Raped Women" appeared in Pushcart Prize, XIX: Best of the Small Presses (New York 1995). Black River Press published a chapbook of her poems, Talk To Me (New Orleans 1987). She has an M.F.A. from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst; lives in Atlantic Beach, Florida; and is available for readings and workshops.

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