Light Subtracts Itself

Book Description
In this book, the poetry of Maryfrances Wagner darkens and deepens with the grace and insight gained from bearing up under the loss of loved ones and the passing of years. In a style that is accessible in the best sense of the word--straightforward, lucid, concrete--she coaxes a rich music out of her lines. And though much of this book is elegiac in tone, resolution, hope, and sometimes wry humor also run through it. But memory drives this collection, which smells of basil and tastes of Zia Rosie's "oozing cannoli dipped in cioccolato." As Wagner says in the poem "Attic": "I need to root through tins and trunks,/resurrect old purses, peer into dark corners./I have to know what I can retrieve." Lik the archeologist Howard Carter, she has retrieved "wonderful things." --William Trowbridge, Author of The Packing House Contada.

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