THE HATCHET AND THE HAMMER is part long poem, part essay in fragments, about real and imagined violence. In this chapbook, the writer looks back at three intersecting traumas—the unraveling of a long-term relationship with a partner with a diagnosis of Harm OCD, the death of her father due to prolonged alcoholism, and a story she learns of how her grandfather once attacked her grandmother with a hammer. Here, the writer attempts to make meaning from trauma and interrogate her own role in these fractured relationships. The chapbook takes a layered, polyvocal approach by collaging lines from poets, medical research, and other found texts. At the heart of this project, driving it like an engine, is a central question--how do I know when I have the truth about myself?