Archon / After

"In her frankly feminist ninth collection, Kocher (godhouse) dissects the dangers beneath the male gaze, the specter of which shadows women everywhere. . . . These whip-smart and evocative poems derive meaning from both the darkness and the light, drawing readers in with a beguiling intimacy." * Publishers Weekly *
"Kocher’s Archon/After performs a languid scorching in reverse. Insisting through fragment and association, the question arises: Can there exist a time uncomplicated and unfettered by memory’s narrativizing, un-haunted by the inevitable outcome of the meat of the body? There is only complication and turbulence. This rumination is a matter for poetry and physics, for Kocher’s incisive language, though the speaker insists, 'No language exists safely.' There is no safety here. In devastation upon devastation we begin with survival, witnessing the desperation of worry, of 'a soul failing to recognize itself walking toward itself,' and that 'A fragment may never get close enough to itself to be whole again.' Do not come to this book expecting any facile answers, come instead to search the mirror of yourself. Expect questions. Expect to 'murmur your way back' to your own self." -- Rajiv Mohabir, author of "I Will Not Go: Translations, Transformations, and Chutney Fractals"
"Archon/After skillfully 'unwraps itself from a meridian of pulpy vertebrae.' What I mean to say it’s these powerful invocations, their 'yearning the perpetuity of return,' carry me to what the poem necessitates: a place where Kocher’s skilled phrases bring about a guided telepathy that provokes action into a sense-making we desperately need and into which we settle. Kocher’s gorgeous and erudite stamina deepen and arrest the poetic line with so much wisdom. Her Archon/After is what we require right now." -- Prageeta Sharma, author of "Grief Sequence"