The Determined Days

Great themes, depth, insight, rhythmic, beautiful and precise language, characters that come alive, images that haunt long after the book is closed.

Stephens's poems exhibit again and again that most difficult accomplishment of poetry-- making the marriage of complex language and portentous themes seem effortless. Like Frost, Stephens casts many of his blank verse poems into the voices of characters, men and women, who reflect on their situations or interact within the narrative. The language, especially the dialogue, is simple and eloquent, and always moving. The poems tell stories of relationships, lonely lives, and, most effectively, of work. The third section's sequence of poems depicting a group of railroad signalmen stands alone as a stunning accomplishment. Stephens's characters are often blue-collar, uneducated, and sometimes brutal, but he lets them speak honestly and powerfully. The Determined Days is an often dark but always affecting book, written in a voice that is uniquely American and tremendously talented.