"With language that's as simple as it is musical, Di Piero sets
dazzling moments amid plainsong."--"The New York Times Book
Review"
"Di Piero's poems throb with the intensity of urban life, buried
anger, and old griefs that still ache."--"San Francisco
Chronicle"
"Di Piero hopes to evoke something of the true mystery of
present and recalled experience, and his poems powerfully enact
this desire."--"The Philadelphia Inquirer"
W.S. Di Piero marries a streetwise, working-class sensibility to
an intellectual rigor and precise language in poems that stare down
depression, failed love, and urban nightlife. In a fast-paced,
half-cracked/half-sane style reminiscent of bebop solos, Di Piero
forges masterful poems that "keep it close, loose, and sweaty," and
restore life's intensity while showing where real hope might be
found.
From "Only in Things":
"Some days, who can stare at swathes of sky,
leafage and bad-complected whale-gray streets,
tailpipes and smokestacks orating sepia exhaust,
or the smaller enthusiasms of pistil and mailbox key,
and not weep for the world's darks on lights, lights on
darks,
how its half-tones stay unchanged in their changings,
or how turning wheels and wind-trash and revolving doors
weave us into wakefulness or dump us into distraction?"
W.S. Di Piero was born in south Philadelphia and grew up in an
Italian working-class neighborhood. He received a master's degree
from San Francisco State University. His honors include a
Guggenheim fellowship and the Raiziss/de Palchi Book Prize for
Italian translation. He teaches at Stanford University and lives in
San Francisco, California.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!