Inheritance of Light: Contemporary Poetry

Ray Gonzalez — editor.

Contributors: Betty S. Flowers, Lee Meitzen Grue, Robert Burlingame, Patty Turner, Robert A. Franklin, Grady Hillman, Claudio San Miguel, Lynn Doyle, Sheryl St. Germain, Margie McCreless Roe, Richard Sale, Theresa May, Milt McLeod, Janet McCann, Rosemary Catacalos, Valerie Crosswell, Veda Smith, Mario Landeros Zuniga, Robert Fink, Carol Coffee Reposa, Pat Mora, Susan Bright, Jana Neugebauer, Gary Grelli, Devreaux Baker, John Gorman, Mary Vanek, Marylyn Croman, Janice Whittington, Charles Behlen, Sandra Reiff, Natalia Trevino, Elaine P. Sullender, Nan Cuba, Martha Elizabeth, Ray Gonzalez, Carmen Tafolla, Andre de Korvin, Steve Wilson, Assef Al Jundi, Naomi Shihab Nye, William Burford, R. S. Gwynn, Michael Lieberman, DF Brown, Mark Kessinger, Walter McDonald, Cynthia McDonald, William D. Barney, Sandra Lynn, Ida Steven, Miles Wilson, Bobby Byrd, Joyce James, Dave Oliphant, Paul Christensen, Tim Seibles, Ralph La Charity, Dwight Fullingim, Christopher Woods, Jerry Bradley, Glenn Hardin, Peggy Kelley, Bryce Milligan, Lynn D. Gilbert, Robert Bonazzi, Gilliam Burton, Robert McArthus, Jan Epton Seale, William Virgil Davis, Leslie Ullman, John Blair, Wendy Barker, Jack Myers, Sandra Blystone, James Hoggard, Carol Barrett, Melissa Shepard, James Mardis, Joseph Colin Murphy, Anne Alejandro

Subject: Poetry

February, 1996

Published

288

Pages

Index.

Features

$24.95

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Hardcover

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About Gonzalez's Inheritance of Light

“I truly believe this anthology represents the best poetry being written in the Southwest today.” —from the Preface

Inheritance of Light is divided into five parts, each part containing poems set in a flowing sequence based on similar themes and concerns.

Part One contains introductory, surreal poems about the art of poetry and the creative process—an intense opening. “Let us consider seeing the nebula as they did/on that first night of the world.” —Patty Turner

Part two contains autobiographical poems about the family, growing up, and ancestors. Part Three is the political section with a number of poems about war, politics, and global matters. Part Four may have the most personal, confessional, yet universal poems about the poets’ reactions to the world around them.

Part Five contains poems about journeys, reaffirmation, renewal, life and death, which brings the whole book to an emotional closing. “What then, when your heart feels home, the sun rises full,/ a world stirs, awakens? What then, when the silver light/of the morning star vanishes to greet a day beginning/somewhere else?”—Ann Alejandro

About the Editor

RAY GONZALEZ is poetry editor of Bloomsbury Review and a member of Texas Institute of Letters. He has written two books of poetry, a book of essays, and has edited ten anthologies of contemporary literature.