The Hatching of the Heart

“Margo Swiss goes into the country of George Herbert and shapes a poetry out of grief and grace. She searches for the exact center of what we are, the place of loss and rebirth, and her words return as messengers of glory.”

Richard Greene

“These are brave, compassionate poems. When I began publishing many years ago with Margo Swiss, I looked forward to her byline in every magazine, as I admired then what I admire now--the maturity, the no-nonsense stare in the face of beauty and making of it, no more and no less than the mirror of creation. But now the poems are breathtakingly stark, inviting, wide-ranging in their compassion and locations. . . . I congratulate the readership of spiritual verse in the best sense, since Margo Swiss has opened her store of significant contribution to the canon.”

Pier Giorgio Di Cicco

“The egg metaphor, the image of the broken shell that frees the life within, unifies the four intimately interwoven sections of Margo Swiss's The Hatching of the Heart. . . . The poems dwell at the place of boundaries, the Celtic 'thin places' between heaven and earth, time and eternity. Yet they are always tied to our human particularities, community, our losses and laments, the tender love of family and friends. By entering these poems, we can experience a world where lyrical utterance still sings.”

Susan McCaslin

“Margo Swiss's new book of poems is devout, intense, often heartbreaking, and ultimately uplifting. These are poems for the wounded and grief-smitten: those who know and believe that there is light at the end of the tunnel, but who also know from experience that the light starts out dim and small. With her at times jagged, stepping-stone syntax and unexpected surprising bursts of rhyme, Swiss disarms us with her clarity and honesty. And she brings a touch of the mystic to this collection of spiritually frank poems.”

John Terpstra