Burning Number Five

Burning Number Five is Co-Winner of the first Blue Horse Press Chapbook Contest. It was selected by guest judge Larry D. Thomas, 2008 Texas Poet Laureate. Of the countless poetry collections I have been privileged to enjoy over the years, few indeed have been as startlingly original as Burning Number Five: Power Plant Poems. The poet?s intimate and detailed knowledge of the boilers and other equipment of a power plant is matched by her knowledge of the intricacies of language, employed in this instance with masterful precision and economy. The title poem is a skillfully executed sonnet whose exquisite lines provide an elegant counterpoint to the violence and potential danger of the subject. These poems, although remarkable in their detailed exploration of the powerful machinery of a plant and the numerous potential dangers it poses to those who tend the terrible machines, also illuminate, with subtlety and consummate artistic skill, the broader concepts of human labor and the paradoxical relationship between humans and technology. Burning Number Five is a memorable, seamless merging of art and science. ? Larry D. Thomas, Contest Judge, 2008 Texas Poet Laureate and Member of the Texas Institute of Letters