Strange Wood

Strange Wood, the recipient of the 1997 Winthrop University Poetry Series Award, contains verse remarkable for its fearless insight. The first poems in this lush, lyrical collection are populated with infants and adolescents, while the middle section gives way to bewildered, misguided adults, who are futilely attempting to understand and conquer the myriad difficulties of modern life. The last poems are concerned with deaths -- in the family, in history, and in the abstract. In this astounding debut, Prufer reminds us of the fragility of life in a world where "everything's / the chance for flying / failing somehow", and loss is the hardest truth of all -- "the body blooms, unfolding / then is gone".