Poetry. The poems to be found in this extraordinary book exert obsessive fascination, and they do so on numerous fronts. The title, IN YOUR DREAMS, suggests that this is a dream book; it is important to note, however, that the dreams are not materials of Ted Greenwald's inward musings. They are propelled outward, rather, to 'your dreams, ' which is to say ours--we of the shared, not-so-nice realities of the contemporary world. It is also important to note the affective import of the title: it is witty and slightly melancholy and caustic and confrontational. The poems reflect not some dreamy inner consciousness but on-going social processes with their intricate (and some might say relentless) patterns. Patterning is perceptible in the structure of the poems, and that is a manifest source of the technical fascination they yield. Indeed, Greenwald has produced a masterpiece of the American variable foot. But the emotional power of this utterly compelling book emerges from the inter-personal conditions that give the poems their thrust. The poems speak in and out of love, irritation, tension, wry amiability, nervous and unnerving intimacy; they represent daily interplay, quotidian perseverations; they resonate with comic intensity and the blues. That's it: they are beautiful and very bluesy--Lyn Hejinian
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