Some Hard Stars knits together past and present in pursuit of a deeper understanding of love, rebirth, and sustaining joy. Through poems full of care and tenderness for family, neighbors, and friends, Thacker demonstrates how “love requires / a willing mind,” especially when confronting the difficulties of mortality with honesty. These poems sing and think out loud, through traditional forms and meters as well as through music invented for the needs at hand. They are intense and exacting in their questions, careful and complex in their laments, and delicate with sacred moments of change.

David Thacker is a recipient of the Creative Writing Award from the Western Literature Association and a Pushcart Prize Special Mention, and he was selected by Tracy K. Smith for Best New Poets. His poems have appeared in Image, The Kenyon Review, Orion, Ploughshares, Tin House, and elsewhere. He received his MFA from the University of Idaho and his PhD from Florida State University. He teaches at the Ethel Walker School, where he chairs the English Department, runs the Visiting Writer Seminar, and is the Director of Community Partnerships (a relationships-based service program). Some Hard Stars is his first book.