Book by Parker, Alan Michael
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With a delicate lucidity, the poems in this first collection explore varieties of solitude. At the center is the three-part sequence "The Widow," which details the day's activities and musings of its title character with a gentle, effective specificity, as in this evocation of a sickroom: "the drawn blinds pulsing like a vein;/ the carpet mined with lemon drops,/ used Kleenex, and the overturned/ gray flowers of a jigsaw puzzle." Bereavement and loss yield a loneliness that is itself a kind of death, "like the summer she was/ condemned to summer camp,/ writing home to tell her parents she had died." The sonnet "A Little Something" begins with the conditional "Because a doe broke through the Saunders' fence/ to starve beside the heated pool, her thin/ ribs cupped like fingers leaking light. Again, the kettle whistles, dogs bark--the sense we make of being singularly here evaporates." Even in a traditional wedding song, "Epithalamium: In Our Cities," Parker limns reticence. The inevitable solitariness of two lives belies the union of matrimony: "My first kiss was a tin can;/ yours a medieval etching." The deft, formal quality of these poems coupled with Parker's eye for the telling detail make this a book of stirring, quiet beauty.
Copyright 1997 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
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Seller: Munster & Company LLC, ABAA/ILAB, Corvallis, OR, U.S.A.
Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Alef Books, 1997. Signed, inscribed and dated by author on Title page; spine very faintly sunned; top edge very faintly bumped; binding tight; cover, edges and interior intact and very clean, except where noted. . Signed by Author. Soft Cover. Very Good. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall. Seller Inventory # 599514
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Seller: Eat My Words Books, Minneapolis, MN, U.S.A.
Paperback. Condition: USED_VERYGOOD. Inscribed by author. Binding tight. Pages unmarked and bright. Cover has a little wear, and mild bend to corners carries throughout small volume. ; 8.50 X 6 X 0.50 inches; Signed by Author. Seller Inventory # 19216
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Seller: biblioboy, North Providence, RI, U.S.A.
Pamphlet. Condition: USED_FINE. y First Edition. New York: Alef Books. New York: Alef Books First edition of the author's first collection of poems. This copy has been warmly inscribed to "Forrest" [Gander, co-editor of Lost Roads Publishers] and signed and dated in the year of issue ["Dec. 1997"] by the author on the title page. This is the sixth book in the Alef Series of Poetry and Translation. 47 pages. Fine copy.; Signed by Author .192 May 1997 . Fine. Pamphlet. y First Edition. 1st Printing. 1997. Seller Inventory # 45915
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