<d103>02</d103> <div>The early poems of an American master<br><br><i>"I have loved the air outside Shop-Rite Liquor</i><br><i>on summer evenings</i><br><i>better than the Marin hills at dusk</i><br><i>lavender and gold</i><br><i>stretching miles to the sea.</i><br><br><i>At the junction, up from the synagogue</i><br><i>a weeknight, necessarily</i><br><i>and with my father--</i><br><i>a sale on German beer.</i><br><br><i>Air full of living dust:</i><br><i>bus exhaust, air-borne grains of pizza crust</i><br><i>wounded crystals</i><br><i>appearing, disappearing</i><br><i>among streetlights and unsuccessful neon."</i><br><i>--"Poetics"</i><br><br>August Kleinzahler's first collections won him a cult following but have long been out of print and hard to find. Here Kleinzahler--acclaimed by <i>The Times </i>(London) for the "vision and confident skill to make American poetry new"--has selected the best of the poems collected in <i>Storm over Hackensack </i>(1985) and <i>Earthquake Weather </i>(1989) and added an autobiographical Preface.<br></div> <div>The early poems of an American master<br><br><i>"I have loved the air outside Shop-Rite Liquor</i><br><i>on summer evenings</i><br><i>better than the Marin hills at dusk</i><br><i>lavender and gold</i><br><i>stretching miles to the sea.</i><br><br><i>At the junction, up from the synagogue</i><br><i>a weeknight, necessarily</i><br><i>and with my father--</i><br><i>a sale on German beer.</i><br><br><i>Air full of living dust:</i><br><i>bus exhaust, air-borne grains of pizza crust</i><br><i>wounded crystals</i><br><i>appearing, disappearing</i><br><i>among streetlights and unsuccessful neon."</i><br><i>--"Poetics"</i><br><br>August Kleinzahler's first collections won him a cult following but have long been out of print and hard to find. Here Kleinzahler--acclaimed by <i>The Times </i>(London) for the "vision and confident skill to make American poetry new"--has selected the best of the poems collected in <i>Storm over Hackensack </i>(1985) and <i>Earthquake Weather </i>(1989) and added an autobiographical Preface.<br></div>