The Collected Poems of Joyce Stein

The Collected Works of Joyce Stein is more than a book of poetry: it is a life in verse, a chronicle of the transition from old to new at the turn of the millennium. From travels to distant locales, to motherhood and love, to mysticism and simple observations of daily life, the reader witnesses the poetic unfolding of the author’s rich experience and global awareness. Nothing lies beyond Stein’s eye, and her attentiveness to seemingly mundane minutiae yields expansive realizations about family, the self, the body, and human nature-a string becomes a meditation on mortality, a newborn child shines star-like, and a rafter ＂is surfaced with an ever-changing eye. A sloe-eyed Egyptian hieroglyph.＂ But Stein’s vision is not limited to her own joys and trials. Her work reaches back through her family’s history to unravel her own unique position in time: ＂We are ragged at the edges; our boundaries spread so widely that we have passed each other by.＂ And as in a life lived to brimming, the reader will find the spectrum of human feeling and consciousness here, including the poet’s love for her sons, grandchildren, friends, and even complete strangers. The reader, too, as they absorb her words, will find themselves included in the poet’s wide compassion, be inspired to look as closely as she did, and, finally, feel lucky to behold her vision, ＂to be here＂ in the world Joyce Stein so clearly relished.