Synopsis "Years Later: Poems"
The tone is established from the outset: wry, wise, sardonic and playful, drawing the reader irresistibly in. Solonche is revealed as a philosopher in the mold of Wittgenstein: aphoristic, charismatic, acerbic and oddly mystical. If you met this book in a bar, you would definitely want to take it home with you and every day thereafter congratulate yourself on how lucky you've been. But that is true of all his books.- David Mark WilliamsThe best feature of Solonche's poetry is its diversity. Everyone who encounters this volume (including the postman who delivers it to you) will find something in it to understand and remember - and a great deal to enjoy.- Tony Beyer"Solonche is productive and prolific, but that doesn't water down his poetry... He can compress a philosophical treatise into three lines... His epigrammatic tidy poems are philosophic gems. Solonche sees humor and encapsulates it; he frames a thought in perfect verse... He's playful and profound - the more he writes, the more he seems to know. Beneath the Solonche simplicity are significant social comments, and his goodwill reinforces the best in us."- Grace Cavalieri, Washington Independent Review of BooksIn a style that favors brevity and pith, J.R. Solonche brings a richness of experience, observation, and wit into his poems. Here is the world! they exclaim. And here, and here, and here! Watched over by ancient lyric gods - Time, Death, and Desire - we find the quotidian here transformed.- Christopher Nelson, editor of Green Linden PressJ.R.Solonche's many books of poetry, one nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, reveal a wry and vivid wit, a sharp but sympathetic eye, and a respect for the homely but significant detail, all wedded to an acute social and cultural consciousness. In his imaginative progress through city streets and country roads, the commonplace becomes the extraordinary... In lines full of mischief or romance, gaiety or grief, he is the poet of the every day, spent on earth or in an imaginary heaven.- Judith Farr, author of What Lies Beyond: Poems and The Passion of Emily Dickinson J.R. Solonche has published poetry in more than 400 maga¬zines, journals, and anthologies since the early 70s. He is the author of nineteen books of poetry and coauthor of another. He lives in the Hudson Valley.
