An impressive collection containing sensuous, visceral imagery that tells us what it means to be a daughter, lover, wife, and mother. “Tropical Depression,” “The Class Reunion,” “Hats,” “Heart Attack,” and “The Old Man’s Drum” evoke those aspects of the earth and the body, the heart and the mind that make us human.
—David Northrup
Recipient of the 2007 Hauser Award for Fiction,
Chautauqua Readers and Writers
Like the softened edge of a lit moon, Adele Steiner’s poems reflect back the poet’s sense of mystery and connection found in the world that surrounds her, from her own circle of family and friends, to the larger sphere where, in a Mexican cavern, Side to side/rock masses shitfed to love one another/bone dry…. She makes visible the intricacies of feeling and thought that exist below the surface of experience, where one goes on contemplating the birth of a child, a mother’s death, the broken life of a war-damaged soldier, a Georgia O’Keefe flower, and the near-forgotten sting of a teenage girl’s wayward sprung garter. These are poems that mark the passage of time as seen through an eye and heart that is always vigilant, ever moonlighting, day and night.
—Marie Pavlicek-Wehrli
Recipient of a Maryland Individual Artist Award
The quality of a poet’s attention tells much. In her poems, Adele Steiner’s attention is unfailingly intimate and heartfelt whether focused on a close family member or a whole city. Her poems lyrically refocus the reader’s attention away from the hectic, mechanical pace of contemporary life back to what is most human and most vital.
—Rhonda Williford
Author of One Wide Sky
Coordinator, Takoma Park Carnegie Library Poetry Series