Instructions for Waking

by Jennifer A. Hartenburg

While these poems provide, as Jennifer Hartenburg’s title suggests, Instructions for Waking, her reader would take care to be fully awake to uncommon linguistic magic from the first word. Measure for measure — and what various and engaging measures these are! — she offers a most astonishingly lush and learnéd gathering of poems in this new collection. I am reminded of Bishop’s famous “eye,” of Moore’s estimable syllabic accomplishment, and the reminiscence simply enhances the delight I take from these canny, linguistically chewy observations. Her wit will have you grinning wide; her wisdom surely will crack your heart a bit. I’m also reminded of the question Jesus posed to the man languishing at the Do you want to be healed? In this collection, Hartenburg Do you want to be awakened?



—Scott Cairns, Author, Correspondence with My Greeks and others





I’ve been looking forward to this collection for years. These poems are dense and lush with the life of the world, with birds and plants and humans fumbling through worship, loss, and lovemaking. Hartenburg is a poet of affirmation, not just of images, but also of sounds — “clinquant,” “melisma,” “rachis.” Her words are invitations to try out new sounds in your own mouth, whether English or Greek or Latin or the withering ecstasy of pronouncing your own place within the world. Here are poems with which to rest, to wake, and — if you are willing — to take wing.



—Timothy E. G. Bartel, Author, A Crown for Abba New and Selected Poems











In Jennifer Hartenburg’s breathtaking debut collection, we are guided by an always inquisitive mind. Her starting points may be literary — Sylvia Plath’s black bull and Kierkegard’s canary, sacred art, or a Sky & Telescope livestream. Always, there is curiosity, luminous language, and rapt attention. Her eye is unflinching, as when she details the decay of a dead grackle, and its transmutation, into “a blessing — a gift of dust.” Add to that her dexterity with poetic forms. In this poet’s hands, the mundane becomes mystic.



—Kathleen O’Toole, Author, This Far, past Poet Laureate of Takoma Park, M

70 pages, Paperback

Published January 2, 2026

Reviews

[Rob]

This book of poems challenged and inspired me. The author is reflective and creative in leaning in to lived experiences and writing about them! I encourage others to check this collection out!

[Brian]

Through exquisitely selected words painstakingly arranged for maximum power, Hartenburg calls her readers to the things of this world-- a world worthy of our attention and care. This remarkable debut from a young poet promises great things to come.