Opera Poems 19812002 Author:Barry Schwabsky Meritage Press is pleased to announce the publication of OPERA, the first book-length collection of poems by Barry Schwabsky. Written over a 22-year-period, OPERA presents a compelling, often ecstatic, poetic body of work by a writer who has been more visible over the past two decades as a respected art critic. Mr. Schwabsky was first published ... more »as a college undergraduate in POETRY magazine and has since published his work in various journals as well as in two chapbooks, the last being FATE/SEEN IN THE DARK in 1985 through the respected poetry publisher, Burning Deck. Over the last decade, however, he has circulated his poems informally or published them only as limited-edition poet-artist collaborations. OPERA now allows Mr. Schwabsky's poetry to be accessible to the larger public. Reflecting a primarily private poetic development, Mr. Schwabsky has created a poetry that transcends the schools and categories that sprung up within the poetry world of recent decades.« less