Marrying America: a Jew in Exile

Wilk is a poet not only of the utmost competence but brilliance. Here is a poet able to give mature voice to the oldest and most enduring American theme: the immigrant as spiritual pilgrim. The clarity of the pilgrim voice is the admirable center of Wilks bookas if a straight-speaking Brooklynite has been hot-wired to the mysteries at the heart of the American experience. Its a compelling voice, rising at times out of violence yet the tone it takes is often of lyric tendernessa tenderness so rare in modern poetry it cause you to sit up straight. Larry Woiwode Wilk maps new territory of the heart and the Heartland. Thats why his poetry is such a marriage with America, when divorce is impossible. Yevgeny Yevtushenko