Dream Work

An ';astonishing' book of poetry from the Pulitzer Prizewinning author of American Primitive and ';one of our very best poets' (Stephen Dobyns,The New York Times Book Review). Dream Work, a collection of forty-five poems, follows Mary Oliver's Pulitzer Prize-winning poetry volumeAmerican Primitive. The deep perceptual awareness on display in that collection is all the more radiant and steadfast here.With this new collection, Oliver has turned her attention to the solitary and difficult labors of the spiritto accepting the truth about one's personal world, and to valuing the triumphs while transcending the failures of human relationships. Oliver brings grace and empathy to the painful legacies of history, whether by way of inheritanceas in her poem about the Holocaust-or through a glimpse into the realities of presentas in her poem about an injured boy begging in the streets of Indonesia. And yet, Oliver's willingness to find light, humanity, and joy continues, deepened by self-awareness, by experience, and by choice.