Arabesque: keyword of a new collection from poet/novelist Rachel Dacus. Arabesques, as in the looped swirls notating language, from its earliest days chiseled in stone, or the graceful curve of a dancer’s toe pointing the opposite way from their outstretched hand. Poems that point in all life’s directions: love and loss, birth and death, family and loneliness, sensuality and discipline-until bipolar opposites balance in an illuminating continuum. Rachel Dacus’ poetry sings and celebrates the body and spirit in form and function, freedom and flight. Throughout this world of journey and process, here and there, she acclaims what underlies, immutable. -Jeff Santosuosso, Editor-in-Chief, Panoply.