A Form of Optimism

by Roy Jacobstein, Lucia Perillo (Introduction)

Filtered through the twin lenses of human history and personal memory, and suffused with ironic appreciation, A Form of Optimism engages in a prismatic meditation on beauty and evil, cornucopia and loss. The book becomes a lyrical mosaic, its compelling poems the broken sharp-edged and colorful, translucent, evocative. Drawing on the author's cross-cultural work in international health, the poems range widely and naturally across setting, personage, and tongue--from Istanbul to Detroit, Mother Teresa to Gorm the Old, Swahili to Sanskrit. Variously anxious, rueful, witty, tender, and worn, A Form of Optimism transcribes an arc of compassion and hope, embracing the sublime mysteries of the world and the word.

60 pages, Paperback

First published October 31, 2006

Reviews

[Kent · Rating 3 out of 5]

I guess I'm just not quite sure where the poems are trying to take me. I appreciate the elegaic final section to Agha Shahid Ali, but I guess what I'm trying to understand is what all these poems add together to make. The book reminds me a lot of "Western History," whose facts don't really seem to add up to some larger statement, though Jacobstein takes me to his own conclusion about bombs and handmade grenades.

[Julene · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful book of poetry by a skilled and generous of heart poet. One I go back to and read for solace.