History of My Heart

Awarded the William Carlos Williams Prize. First published in 1984, Pinsky's History includes parents and boyhood neighbors, Fats Waller warming the Christmas crowd at Macy's, Holocaust victims and inspired derelicts. Pinsky has a rare gift for action, character, and atmosphere clearly and buoyantly proportioned. --Roland Flint, The New York Times Book Review "The Figured Wheel" is a mad, brilliant vortex that draws into itself gods, men, art, rags and bones, atoms and dust. Simply reading the poem is breathtaking; it starts its uninterruptible progression, gradually gaining speed and power, and ends in a violent giant step over self and art. It is in every sense a stunning and dangerous poem. --Joan Todden Keefe, San Francisco Chronicle.