A Crossing of Zebras: Animal Packs in Poetry

Despite its arresting cover and its focus on animal poems, this collection lacks consistency. The 14 poems highlight intriguing collective nouns and alternate between clever descriptions of real-life animals and off-the-wall fantasies about them. But often the poems’ meters are wobbly, the conceits are labored, and the rhymes are off-center or forced. Likewise, Huber’s intricate scratchboard illustrations, most of them enhanced with colored ink, are unevenly executed. They marvelously capture the delicate veins in a “charm of butterflies,” the bold black-and-white designs contained in a “crossing of zebras” and the terror of a scarecrow confronting a “murder of crows.” But when depicting other animals, like “a pounce of alley cats” or the armor-clad “crash of rhinos,” the figures seem rigid and awkward. Sometimes the illustrations do not match a poem’s content—only 17 of the author’s 22 “cartload of monkeys” are shown, and the “band of coyotes”giving a 1960s “psychedelic” concert “talking ’bout my generation” include, oddly, members tooting a kazoo and a hunting horn. A note from the author explains the etymologies of some favorite collective nouns. Patricia MacCarthy’s unfortunately out-of-print Herds of Words remains the exemplar of this concept. Ages 8-12. (Apr.)