...to live in this world

I believe it is possible-in fact, it is highly likely-that the reader will lose herself in these rare and exquisite poems, where we are seduced by hue and honey...stars flung, comets crashing...where morning is waiting just outside the door. For Judy Hood's debut poetry collection, to live in this world, glows brilliant with hope and the sustenance of guava, mango, tamarind, and Florida Florida Florida in all its inland glut and glory, its frangipani gardens, baby palms, and avocado groves, the way everything springs abundant even now, in this pandemic time when we need it most. I've read Hood's words over and over, on the way to, coming from, and I've felt the honesty in them along with their lush and lyrical beauty and the comfort they so generously give. They engage me on a cellular level. I feel heard.

-Maureen Seaton, author of Undersea




Judy Hood crafts these marvelous poems with a gardener's patience and loving attention. Teeming with frangipani, poinciana and tamarind, the lush landscape of these poems renews my belief that it is indeed a miracle to live in this world.

-Mia Leonin, Fable of the Pack-Saddle Child.




Lovely, lyrical, and graceful, these pieces lift from the page like songs from a pure soul.

-Diana Abu-Jaber, Life Without a Recipe