Confessions of a Captured Angel

In these wise and lovely mortal ruminations Neil Carpathios, long one of my favorite poets, turns fifty, that perilous promontory from which the world starts to flicker like an old neon sign. But age just makes Carpathios pay attention all the more keenly. The joy of this book is that it makes us pause with him on our little human journey and take in the view while we still have time. You couldn't ask for a better guide. -George Bilgere

The poems in Neil Carpathios' new book, though much concerned with death, are very much alive: intelligent, tender, humorous, entertaining, and even profound-sometimes all at the same time. As the best poets do, Carpathios celebrates our astonishing luck in being able, however limited our time, to "behold the lipstick kiss on a glass's rim," and "listen to the crickets." -Charles Harper Webb