Selected from Ricardo Sternberg's four collections, along with astonishing new poems, One River is a major event. A poet who, according to one reviewer, "has divined the secret connections between the words," Sternberg's voice is unlike any other: witty, earthy, exuberant, inventive. His poems also forgo conventional subjects. Alchemists, mermaids, angels, and "jongleur" grasshoppers share space with all manner of eccentrics: a trapeze artist, a pilot who navigates by smell, a millionaire who sneaks into heaven disguised as a camel. At the heart of Sternberg's practice is prestidigitation: the sleight of hand that inheres in effortless turns of phrase, brisk syntax, and bold forms. "Leave it to me," he says to his muse, "to come up with something / that while not highfalutin, /carries a whiff of the sublime." Charismatic and original, Sternberg's enduring work is captured in all of its extraordinary range in this new book.

Ricardo Sternberg's previous books include The Invention of Honey, Map of Dreams, Bamboo Church, and Some Dance. He is also the author of a book on the Brazilian poet Carlos Drummond de Andrade. His poetry has been widely published on both sides of the border in journals such as Descant, The Walrus, The Fiddlehead, The Paris Review, The Nation, Poetry (Chicago) and Ploughshares. He lives in Toronto.

Ricardo Sternberg's profile page