Rough Honey is a miracle of a first collection. Melissa Stein's sensuous articulation of the world from the inside out puts her poems into a kind of freefall---back into a pulsing, primal language. Her electric apprehensions throb with this nearly preverbal knowing. They are rough as a hound's tongue; they are honey itself. Above all they define and redefine the lyric poem, giving it myriad protean identities. Stein is a new poet of the first order.---Molly Peacock<BR><BR>Openness---of form, and of the receptive and longing body---is Rough Honey's central subject, and its oxymoronic title suggests the sweet and fierce character of desire, that compelling and dangerous sustenance...Stein's poems are lit by a restless and flashing verbal intelligence...Her sentences are beautifully choreographed; they start and stop the motion of her poems with a nearly invisible, effortless authority...---Mark Doty, from the Introduction<BR><BR>In this piercing debut collection, in language that is seductively alert and textured enough to evoke rarely contemplated worlds, Melissa Stein appraises splendor and terror with a lyricism that feels dangerous and original. Such a passionate vision deserves our attention. I am thrilled to see through her eyes.---Major Jackson<BR><BR>Melissa Stein writes with the intoxicating energy of one of those ancient honey priestesses called Melissae and yet her art is as carefully honed as the goddesses' altars. Sweet with language, tough with skill, Rough Honey is a stunning poetic debut.---Sandra Gilbert