Frank Bidart is one of the true living masters of contemporary poetry: His unwaveringly intense inward gaze (which is offset by his need to constantly analyze and consume both high and low culture) is revered by poets and readers alike. He picks his words as though his life depends on them, because for him, it does. In his eighth volume, Bidart, who is now in his '70s, looks back at a long and, as his poems portray it, lonely life of writing and reading. He mixes in healthy doses of

—Craig Morgan Teicher