Constellations

Daniel Mark Epstein's poetry has been in the public eye for nearly sixty years, since the magazine publication of the poems in his groundbreaking first book, No Vacancies in Hell (1973). Critics praise the erotic and spiritual lyricism of his poetry, as well as its power in capturing crucial moments of American history in dramatic monologues, including prize-winning portraits of a yellow fever epidemic and Henry Adams's tragic marriage. Of The Traveler's Calendar (2002), Booklist commented, "Biographies of Nat King Cole and Edna St. Vincent Millay have won Epstein greater renown, but his best writing is his mythically and historically haunted poetry." The critic Adam Kirsch called Dawn to Twilight (2015), a selection of Epstein's lyric poems, "a testament to the achievement of a major American poet." Constellations collects, for the first time, the nine books of poems published by a modern master of lyric, dramatic, and narrative poetry. A stirring selection of new work includes the sonnet sequence "Cruel April: Poems from the Pandemic," which inspired a 2020 short film featuring Tyne Daly.