Winner of the 2003 Norma Farber First Book Award“Many poets would sell their souls for one true poem. Sean Singer has a different relationship with Mephistopheles. He gives his soul away—and it’s given back—and so his poems are freely his; and they are true. Some are purely lyrical; some are written in tongues; they are all written in poetry. Too much verse in either tradition—the tradition of meters and the tradition of free verse—isn’t written in poetry at all. Much ‘poetry’ isn’t poetry (thus the need for deals with the devil). Too much of it is thematics or contrivance. Not Sean Singer’s poetry. Mr. Singer isn’t afraid to write metaphor (dark planed & luminary), to test the voice—that poor arrow—or to try to write beautiful lines. A reader may think, while reading Singer’s poems, of the improvisations of jazz. A reader will be reminded of the beautiful motions of the mind. Sean Singer’s book is a revelation.”—Carol Frost, poet
