The poems from Jill Hoffman's new book Kimono with Young Girl Sleeves talk about difficult subjects - aging, death, the loss of loved ones. But they do it with honesty and the audacity of youth. The fearlessness of her work makes it relevant and very much alive. -- Anna Halberstadt, Vilnius Diary

Jill Hoffman's poems have a compulsion to throw themselves into tumultuous life. Their flamboyance and pleasures cannot be divorced from the anxieties of family life or friendship. And the poems keep on returning asking for more. Her devotion to dogs—and their own perilous lives—cannot be separated from friendships, lovers and children. No one is left off the hook here. There is a courage to this experiencing of life and facing up to its contradictory needs. The poems evince themselves in the risk of life. A courage of writing exemplified in such poems as "Lame Villanelle," "Relay," and "Ellipsis." -- Richard Fein, Losing It / Dear Yiddish

Jill Hoffman's poems have an honesty that teeters on the edge of revelation and then swipes left before too much family blood is spilled, and from the flesh wounds memories emerge whose lethal points are wrapped in olive leaves. Hoffman namechecks various contemporaries with praise both robust and faint, more generous nevertheless than most of her fellow scriveners in the insular world of New York poets. This lively collection from her octogenarian period is a muscular, tender and singular contribution to an overcrowded field. -- Max Blagg, Late Start for Mardi Gras

It's very comforting to live in the world of Jill Hoffman's poems. These are full of poets out and about in the world, always talking and writing. The poems have such tender affection for efforts at honesty. Poets' thoughts, on paper and in life, mingle with one's own, providing some inkling—in the back of a mind, as one buys one's groceries—of what life might actually be like. -- Karin Roffman, The Songs We Know Best: John Ashbery's Early Life

Jill Hoffman's first book of poems, Mink Coat, was published by Holt, Rinehart and Winston in 1973. Her first novel, Jilted, was published by Simon & Schuster in 1993. She founded Box Turtle Press in 1983 and has since published 44 books: 24 issues of Mudfish, starting with Mudfish 1984 and 20 issues of Mudfish Individual Poet Series. Kimono with Young Girl Sleeves is Mudfish Individual Poet Series #20. Before that, Box Turtle Press published her collection black diaries (poems) in 2000 and The Gates of Pearl (a book-length poem) in 2018. In 2023, a second novel, Stoned, was published (Mudfish Fiction Series 1). She is also a painter and has painted the covers for many of these books.

Hoffman has a BA from Bennington, a Master's degree from Columbia and a Ph.D. from Cornell. She received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1974 to 1975. She has taught at Columbia University, Brooklyn College, Bard, The University of North Carolina, The New School, and other institutions. Presently she teaches a Mudfish Writing Workshop on Zoom from her Tribeca, New York studio.

"Kimono with Young Girl Sleeves is a beautifully alluring title, and the poems that follow surprise and delight with their candor and with the skillful irony that permits the poet to translate autobiography into poetry."
— David Lehman, One Hundred Autobiographies / Series Editor Best American Poetry

"Kimono with Young Girl Sleeves is a tour-de-force, striking at the heart of what it means to be alive; you’ll find yourself laughing and crying as Hoffman mediates on art, aging, love, and loss. Like Vermeer, or any master of interior life, she beautifully illuminates the moments that make a life whole."
— Ross Barkan, Glass Century

"She paints in ultramarine violet, belly dances, cares for pets and partners, and is bound to her ancestry. In this intimate, intense and revealing book, Hoffman shares the dialect of rage while illustrating the resilience of women. I don’t only love these poems, I am grateful for this collection being in the world."
— Paul Schaeffer, The Cruelties of Brooklyn

"The poems in Jill Hoffman’s Kimono with Young Girl Sleeves chronicle her long life as a poet and a painter. Her voice is modest, sometimes full of sadness, and essential. I admire the restraint and perspective found in her spare language. The poems celebrate a creative life tempered by loss and longing, discovery and delight, and unexpected moments of pleasure."
— Rodger Moody, Self-Portrait / Sixteen Sevenlings

"Kimono with Young Girl Sleeves is the compelling new collection by poet Jill Hoffman, writing at the height of her powers to survey a life spent in the New York art and literary worlds. Bringing a painter’s eye for the vivid image to vignettes of the ordinary and everyday, Hoffman spins them into thrillingly sublime effect. Set against the upheaval of Covid, these poems speak to love and estrangement, hope and heartbreak, all under the illuminating shadows of advancing age and mortality."
— Richard Mott, Poet and Environmentalist

"Jill Hoffman’s poems have a compulsion to throw themselves into messy life. Their flamboyance and pleasures cannot be divorced from the anxieties of family life or friendship. And the poems keep on returning asking for more. Her devotion to dogs—and their own perilous lives—cannot be separated from friendships, lovers and children. No one is left off the hook here. There is a courage to this experiencing of life and facing up to its contradictory needs. The poems evince themselves in the risk of life. A courage of writing exemplified in such poems as Lame Villanelle, Relay, and Ellipsis."
— Richard Fein, Losing It / Dear Yiddish