Misery Prefigured by J. Allyn Rosser

David Gullette recommends
Misery Prefigured, poems by J. Allyn Rosser: “The voice in Rosser’s second book is sassy and self-assured: ‘To say
screw them, to be screw-them / bent on one thing all but lost, / one music or mystery, / beyond all the necessary / incidental snaggings of the heart.’ In ‘Prell’ a man has inherited ‘that look from every man regarding / every woman, that awful look of resignation / to face the rich green goo of her being.’ But her blowsy, muscular ease can alternate with little gems of observation: ‘small birds flying / out of focus on the flat white sky.’ A poet you need to know: buy this book. Winner of the 2001 Crab Orchard Award.” (Southern Illinois)