The Eye That Desires to Look Upward

Poems by Steven Cramer

“Thoughtful, balanced, beautiful—these poems are also acts of emboldenment. ‘Earthly versions of paradise’ appear nearby to the poet, who constantly glances up from the workaday. At times he seems ripe to push off with Gauguin. Already he quietly proposes ‘what if’ and ‘suppose,’ wrapping scenes, and representations of scenes, in lovely, intimate tones struck from loss and desire.”
—Marvin Bell

“There is a disarming beauty and a resonant calm to Steven Cramer’s poetry. The graces and sly ironies of the world haunt these poems, and they are as startling as starlight rippling through an empty meadow. This is a superb debut.”
—David St. John