Glorious

Joan Handler's poems speak of the transmigration of a woman from an emotionally stifled girlhood through the first tentative steps of self-discovery, to, finally, the apostasy of womanhood and the ecstasy that everyday rebellion can bring. Handler undertakes daring experiments with form, shifting and thrusting words to underscore the power of the emotions in her words. Words dance on the pages of Glorious. The poetry is at once lyrical and colloquial in its language, almost narrative in its appeal.

JOAN CUSACK HANDLER was co-founder and director of Presenting Poetry and Prose, a literary series at the John Harms Center for the Arts in New Jersey. She has conducted poetry workshops for beginning and experienced writers, served as workshop leader and featured reader at a recent Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival, is a member of the resident faculty at The Frost Place Poetry Festival in Franconia, New Hampshire and sits on the Board of Governors of the Poetry Society of America. Her poems have appeared in Agni, Boston Review, Poetry East, Southern Humanities Review, Journal of New Jersey Poets, Feminist Studies, and Wisconsin Review, and have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize in 1992, 1995, 1996, 1997, and 1998. Recipient of many awards, Ms. Handler was honored by The Boston Review, the Chester H. Jones Foundation, the Eve of St. Agnes Competition, Roberts Writing Awards, Gloucester Country College, and the Allen Ginsberg Competitions.