ACCUMULATED LESSONS IN DISPLACEMENT poems

by Rachel E. Hicks

Published: 2025

Summary:

Rachel, an ATCK, takes the reader on a journey through her poems to the various places she has lived. She tackles some deep issues of race and the plight of refugees, but she also muses over ordinary meals in a farmhouse in China. The book is divided into two sections: “Bright Sadness, Bitter Joy” and “A Deeper Knowing.” But before the sections begin, she starts with a poem titled “Sojourn,” a title that anyone who has lived outside of their passport country may feel, but Rachel takes a different spin —one that everyone can relate to.

Recommendation:

This collection of poems takes the reader on a global journey where many paradoxes take place. Rachel uses her own experience and her gift of words to portray a sensory scene from the realms of the Himalayas to the chaotic feel of post-racial conflicts in Maryland. She offers a space to stop and reflect on what is going on in the heart and mind — to ask the deeper questions of life and to hold the tension with grace.

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