Humming the Thing

Humming the Thing is infused with the celebratory as Theresa Hamman takes us to the land of myth and magic. With elements of steampunk style and ethos, and through such innocuous images as worms, curlers, birds, and apples, we find ourselves in an environment some would call austere: a world of "smeared black/lead" and "tear stained buttery paper/with a frowning sun." Humming the Thing, is grounded in the strength that what is invisible and unknown are supported by forces beyond this planet. Hamman puts these to good use as distress calls and as the expression of wonderment. An exciting new collection by one of rural Oregon's experimental voices, Humming the Thing funnels these essentials of survival into lyrical, kaleidoscopic musings, making us want to sing along.

-Susan Kay Anderson author of Mezzanine

The universal theme of loss, in all its many forms, permeates Hamman's second chapbook of poems, Humming the Thing. Hamman has a unique way of writing about ordinary things, and this is especially so in her poem, 'A Mind Without a Bird.' Many of her poems are personal, such as the wistful 'Urgent Prayer,' when she writes about how 'the weight of years scrawls a marquee across my mother's forehead, bends her back.' One of my favorite poems in this outstanding collection is 'Rural Oregon. Tuesday. In September,' with all its acute sensory observations. Hamman's poignant words strike all the right notes of indelible loss in this noteworthy collection of poems.

-Dianne Alvine author of Child's Play

For years, I have admired Theresa Hamman's unflinching eye and sharp ear for the exactly right turn of phrase in her beautifully honest poetry. She uses the immediate details of daily life-the birth of a new granddaughter, the start of a spring that promises nothing but more cold rain-as an invitation for her reader to delve more deeply into their lives as well, illuminating what John Updike called "the human news," those stories and relationships that can't help but sustain us.

-James Crews, Editor of How to Love the World: Poems of Gratitude & Hope