Chinese Apples

February 26, 2007
DiPiero's motto might be, "Here I am again trying to say/ what I see." The eighth volume and first selected from this San Francisco–based poet and art critic (Brother Fire
) shows a scrupulous, if grim, observer and listener, one whose weighty clarities have grown more moving and more profound with time. DiPiero's first books, from the '80s, examined Italian-Americans in working-class environs, Italians in Italy and the long tradition of seasonal lyric throughout the Western world: "moon, stars, soon day breaking,/ the grave dream dreamed elsewhere." In his '90s books, DiPiero's concisely organized sentences grew more complicated, and more rewarding, even as they maintained his bleak wisdom. From these works through Skirts and Slacks
(2001) and into 15 new poems, realistic panoramas and still lifes combine an interest in gloom, dirt and grit—"the taste of pitch and bus fumes and leaf meal," for example,—with a critic's eye for arrangement and composition. Short lines and pithy advice ("tell what you know now/ of dreadful freshness and want") suggest Stanley Kunitz, though other pronouncements convey a basso profundo all their own: "We die, or kill, or let be killed," one poem decides, "then wake to other minor terror,/ to our intensest selves."

March 15, 2007
From the tailor who's seen the world and makes suits that last forever ("Like magic") to driving sleet that serves as "heaven's post-Christmas gift" to a vision of Poussin as a road crew pours tarmac, Di Piero offers vignettes that are evocative and sharply observed. He always has a scene to paint, a brief story to tell, and readers will find themselves gratefully returning to Chicago with him or watching "Autumn's first days whiten words/ puffed into the market air" as women gather to buy juicy Chinese apples. This selection exhibits the best of Di Piero's eight books, from "The Only Dangerous Thing" (1984) to "Brother Fire" (2004), and adds nearly 20 newly crafted little gems. These new poems might be a bit grittier, but in their ravishingly simple lines ("Lady Know-It-All/ bittersweet/ apple incense/ incensing my room") display Di Piero's true gift as a poet: he writes lucidly but not plainly, delivering crystal-clear verse that can be visually stunning without a pile-up of images. An excellent addition to most poetry collections and a good place for readers unfamiliar with Di Piero to start.Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal

Copyright 2007 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2007
Reading this generous sampling from Di Piero's first seven poetry collections as well as a group of new poems, it's difficult to identify prevailing themes or a consistent tone. Like Charles Wright, who shares his interest in contemporary Italian poetry, Di Piero has produced a diverse body of work that's alternately lush and spare, ranging from raucous character studies drawn from his South Philadelphia youth to somber meditations inspired by the landscapes of his adopted California. The voice is usually relaxed and confiding, yet the poems are strangely impersonal and appealingly modest, telling you little about the author. If Di Piero lacks Wright's lyric gifts, he seems to know and accept it, turning this seeming limitation into a source of strength and even eloquence. "My voice going out has nothing / new to say, no slight / shock of self to lend / a world hammered soft tonight," he writes with disarming candor in "The Divine." "Teach me to learn / I have nothing of my own."(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)