Marvelous Light

Similar to Antonio Vivaldi's The Four Seasons, poems that compose the sections of Claude Wilkinson's Marvelous Light explore nature's cycles with respect to their parallels of, and import to, our human lives. Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione, or The Contest between Harmony and Invention, a title under which Vivaldi's work was first published, suggests part of an overarching theme that is implicit within Wilkinson's collection—that is to say, his poems strive for a balance of euphony and the revelation of artistic rigor. Epigraphs from 1 Peter 2:9 and Henry James's “The Middle Years” serve to enlighten readers as they read the poems that also image divinity's role in the creative process.