Poetry, chapbook, 36 pages, from Bottlecap Features. The poems in Amy Haddad’s The Most Potent Weapon read like “enlightenments from life on the road,” to borrow from Paul Theroux, for those who journey with an end-stage or chronic illness. With a rare insider’s view of the world of health care from the dual perspectives of nurse and patient, Haddad reveals courage, frailty, grace, and humor in poems grounded in clinical authenticity. The chapbook examines everyday life that is filtered through a cancer diagnosis. The poems highlight metaphors commonly used to describe the divides between the ill and well including differences in language, war imagery, and expectations regarding feminine beauty in form and language that are at once subtle, relatable, clear, and often jarring.