The world below the window

William Jay Smith melds an array of influences - from the French Symbolists to W. H. Auden and Wallace Stevens - into his own unmistakable voice, moving powerfully from the compressed, dark lyrics of his pre-World War II poetry ("Quail in Antumn") to experiments with a long, free-verse line in the 1960's ("The Tin Can"). Here are memorable lyrics that capture the horror of World War II ("Dark Valentine: War Poems") and hilarious light verse ("The Tall Poets") that exhibits the wit that has enlivened even Smith's darkest works. Previously uncollected recent poems reveal the poet's tremendous range, as he moves from discussing the ironies of age in "The Shipwreck" to forging the dramatic and moving intensity of "The Cherokee Lottery," which deals with the forced removal of American Indian tribes east of the Mississippi.