[Ai's second book, Killing Floor,] again displays a range of tough-minded images, but these latest poems are further enriched by a framework of quasi-historical vignettes described in the voices of Trotsky, Zapata, Yukio Mishima, Marilyn Monroe and Ira Hayes (an Iwo Jima hero turned skid-row unfortunate). It is Hayes who typifies the poet's reflections on social decay and emotional disaster, admitting: "I'm the one dirty habit / I just can't break."

Dark as this view may be, and however squeamish about themes of mass murder, assassination and infanticide one may be, this poet's authority is uncompromising. She encounters the mirror unshaken, adding ironic emphasis to what is, finally, a motto for her ravishments: "I mean to live."

G. E. Murray, "Book Notes: 'Killing Floor'," in The Nation (copyright 1979 by the Nation Associates, Inc.), Vol. 228, No. 19, May 19, 1979, p. 578.