Jeffrey McDaniel’s poetry cures my loneliness. So much so that I dreaded reaching the end of Thin Ice Olympics. He’s always been a master of metaphor. With this volume he is also a master of mining the marrow of buried bones; buried because they were once too dangerous. Unearthed, McDaniel reframes them both with tenderness and what I refer to as “diagonal” humor. No artifice, no fancy shit, just truth; and this truth is the friend I’m always searching for.
Joan As Police Woman
McDaniel has stunning metaphorical abilities and delivers this gift straight to the reader through his singing, crazy, gorgeous and relentless heart.
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Thomas Lux, praise for Chapel of Inadvertent Joy
Jeffrey McDaniel is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently Thin Ice Olympics (Write Bloody, 2022) Other books include: Holiday in the Islands of Grief (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020), Chapel of Inadvertent Joy (Pittsburgh, 2013), The Endarkenment (Pittsburgh, 2008), The Splinter Factory (Manic D Press, 2002), The Forgiveness Parade (Manic D, 1998), and Alibi School (Manic D, 1995). McDaniel’s poems have appeared in numerous places, including The New Yorker, American Poetry Review, The New York Times, and Best American Poetry 1994, 2010, and 2019. Recipient of an NEA fellowship, he teaches at Sarah Lawrence College.