The Rigid Body (September 2012)By Gabriel SperaISBN: 978-0-912592-92-3Winner of the 2011 Richard Snyder Publication Prize [ Buy Now! ]
Praise for The Standing Wave by Gabriel Spera: “Spera reminds us of Elizabeth Bishop with poems so packed with metaphor we seem in 2004 almost to have forgotten how to read them... reading this book we remember that we love metaphor, love the old ways of speaking, not only in an individual voice but in the collective voice or our conscience. And when we read these poems, we know why poetry has power to reach across time and space... Readers will find in this collection of poems more than one reason to keep the book close by, to reread and sit with these wonderful and compelling jewels of language.” – Eloise Klein Healy, William Archila, Hilda Raz, judges for the PEN Book Award
“...Gabriel Spera tiptoes a fine line, maintaining a balance between formalism and free verse, traditional tropes and verbal originality. When Spera casts his long, clause-riddled sentences into a formal structure, the result is often spectacular. The sentences tumble down through the stanzas like downhill skiers, swerving almost breathtakingly to clip the gate of each rhyme...Spera lets himself be funny at times, sometimes crude, often violent. His verbal flourishes allow the poems to maintain a contemporary feel amidst conventional rhyme schemes. Spera’s talent is strong enough to endure the force of his influences.”
– The Missouri Review
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