SOURCE: A review of Next, in The Woman's Review of Books, Vol. 5, Nos. 10-11, July, 1988, p. 24.

Poet and critic Marilyn Hacker calls Clifton's style in Next one of astonishing economy and her theme one of asserting the connecting spirit.

Lucille Clifton's sixth book, Next, has been much better served by Boa Editions. Her spare, sometimes gnomic poems stand in the middle of their sufficient space, and can sink in. Clifton is a poet of astonishing economy: five or ten pared lines can tell volumes.

 i am the sieve she strains from
little by little
every day

i am the rind
she is discarding.

i am the riddle
she is trying to answer.

something is moving
in the water,
she is the hook.
i am the line.
("4 daughters") 

Lorine Neidecker and Hilda Morley limn in such strokes; Clifton contains, though, in her craft, the force, anger and hope of...