Some of the strength of this whole suite is the riffing and near-association of all the sound, mostly based on or around a single letter or syllable.  It’s like the most sophisticated, smart doodling on a couple of black keys of the piano, late at night, much port wine.

I have been reading and rereading these superb poems for weeks now, with such pleasure. Partly, as I told you, for the strange kismet of the setting of a few of them – that part of Italy, northwest of Rome, far more Etruscan than Roman, and as old as rocks.  I was just there.  But more so, for the sheer delight of the language and passion and clarity of the poems.  They are so heart-broken, jagged, and yet joyous.  It’s going to be a magnificent book, I think.—David Baker

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