Teeth, Guts, and Growths: A Review of Buzzkill Clamshell by Amber Dawn

But in Amber Dawn’s third solo collection of poetry and eighth book with Arsenal Pulp Press, constraint elevates and intensifies. Buzzkill Clamshell opens its first poem, “The Erotics of Chronic Pain,” with an old wives’ tale lifted from The Old Farmer’s Almanac involving whippoorwills and an improbable dance of circularity. As Amber Dawn declares in an ekphrastic poem inspired by Henry Fuseli’s heavy-on-the-chiaroscuro painting Titania and Bottom (1790), “If not friendly, at least fun.