Patricia Goedicke

Patricia Goedicke's poetry has been described in the Times Literary Supplement by David Kirby as "intensely emotional, intensely physical." "More than any contemporary woman poet, perhaps, she exhibits a Whitmanesque exuberance," claims Small Press Review contributor Hans Ostrom. According to Peter Schjeldahl in the New York Times Book Review, Goedicke "bears down hard on the language, frequently producing exact ambiguities of phrasing that are startling and funny." And Harper's reviewer Hayden Carruth believes that Goedicke's poems "have a hard truthful ring, like parables of survival." Goedicke's collection, The Wind of Our Going, "is distinguished by its use of lavish images and multiple comparisons," describes Lex Runciman in Western American Literature. "Her poems delight in their connections, in the sheer physical length and amplitude of their sentences." Ostrom also likes the book, and writes, " The Wind of Our Going shows [Goedicke] to be a confident poet and a poet who has reason to be confident. Although she could benefit from a lighter touch and more varied forms, this is an engaging, vital book."