Buddha alarm clocks, Shiva spice racks, dying gardeners, gunned-down prostitutes, suicidal visionaries, and a god "who is shorter/and a better cook than your God" populate these poems that arrive  Plus Shipping . Demanding our perception of the world in payment, Hicok shows us that time has "bones we can count/and a soul made temporal by math." "Mr. Hicok's gift lies somewhere between those of the surgeon and the god of the foundry and convalescent home: seamlessly, miraculously, his judicious eye imbues even the dreadful with beauty and meaning.."-The New York Times.  "Imagine spring's thaw, your brother said, / each house a small rain, the eaves muttering / like river and you the white skin / the world sheds, your flesh unfolded // and absorbed. You walked Newark together ..." -- "Heroin"