“It makes no sense. You would be strangers / if not for this.”
In Strangers, Rob Taylor makes new the epiphany poem: the short lyric ending with a moment of recognition or arrival. In his hands, the form becomes not simply a revelation in words but, in Wallace Stevens' phrase, “a revelation in words by means of the words.” The epiphany here is not only the poet’s. It’s ours. A book about the songlines of memory and language and the ways in which they connect us to other human beings, to read Strangers is to become part of the lineages (literary, artistic, familial) that it braids together—to become, as Richard Outram puts it, an “unspoken / Stranger no longer.”
This collection of poetry takes the reader on a journey through a vivid, keen observation of life. The author’s voice feels familiar and comforting somehow.
Beautiful book by a very gifted poet. Taylor examines the deep losses in his life in the context of its many joys. Required reading for those in grief as well as celebration.