We fill our days with matter and clutter, objects that might disappear inside their particular and necessary function: soap, a wineglass, nightgown, or thumb. Do we truly think about what the bedroom door has witnessed? Or the fountain, with its sculpture of a boy standing naked in a city square? Like Francis Ponge, Gertrude Stein, Seamus Heaney, and Pablo Neruda, Bar-Nadav makes a poetic investigation of objects to illuminate their visceral and playful potential in our lives.

Hadara Bar-Nadav is also the author of Lullaby (with Exit Sign) (Saturnalia, 2013), The Frame Called Ruin (New Issues, 2012), and A Glass of Milk to Kiss Goodnight (Margie/Intuit House, 2007). She is also co-author of a best-selling textbook, Writing Poems (Longman, 8th edition). She is Associate Professor of English at the University of Missouri in Kansas City.