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“... in the morning constellations found by my fingers mapping your back’s scatter of small moles. Stephen Yenser’s study arrives here laden with ironies and poignancies which have little to do with its merit as a piece of extended criticism. At the moment, almost none of Merrill’s books (which include a dozen volumes of poetry, two novels and a ...”

“... This Collected Poems is not a ‘Complete Poetry’. It omits Merrill’s trilogy of book-length poems, The Changing Light at Sandover, as well as a number of uncollected or unpublished poems. The notes are minimal. Merrill died in 1995: the editors of this volume, who are also his literary executors, apparently decided to publish a reader’s edition in short order ...”

“... own, he wasn’t much of a teacher, but was a delightful presence. One of his students that term, Stephen Yenser, became not only a lifelong friend but one of Merrill’s very best readers, and co-editor, with J.D. McClatchy, of an excellent though overlong 2008 Selected Poems. Reading Merrill at length can feel like being trapped in endless rooms full ...”