The Sorrows of Eros and Other Poems

Drawn from fifteen years of work, The Sorrows of Eros and Other Poems presents a rich selection of the verse of Henry Weinfield. Many of the poems contained here appear for the first time. The sensuous lyricism of the English tradition and the classic austerity of philosophical discourse are brought together in this poetry in a way that is unique in our times. A master of rhyme and meter, Weinfield's sonnets, tercets, and rhyme royal fall upon the ear with rare grace. Brilliantly allusive in their frames of reference, they are woven from the stuff of Dante, Shakespeare, and Shelley: Plato, Genesis, and the Book of Job. Yet Weinfield is also given to the kind of rigorous intellectual speculation that one usually associates with poets such as William Bronk or George Oppen, and a refined process of abstraction never fails to give the work an utterly contemporary edge. His subject matter is equally challenging; here are poems about political violence, the anomie of the postmodern city, the bittersweet disasters of the erotic life. Powerfully chastening, these poems nevertheless can comfort, charm, and delight; they are "The luminous and liquid solacings/ That language proffers against the void."