Reviews of Parallel Play

“Burt finds beauty hemmed in on every side, with a fate that is never completely self-determined.” —✩Publishers Weekly

“With his clear and accessible voice and his willingness to go to the heart of universal issues, Burt has created a collection of startling immediacy and purpose.”—Boston Review

“[Burt’s] poems have an intense yet matter-of-fact sensuality.” —BOMB

“Brilliant, charming, engaging, and highly original.” —Harvard Review

“Burt is a keen collector of what he calls ‘slight/things, small charms,/the jagged ones you have to learn to hear.’ He can turn a night at a noisy New York club, the Bowery Ballroom, into a kaleidoscope of the senses.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune

“[Stephen Burt] can turn a night in New York’s noisy downtown club, the Bowery Ballroom, into a kaleidoscope of the senses. His jump-cut to the subway in “On the ‘A’ Train” shows him at his observant best, a modern-day Frank O’Hara, who does not simply “find” a poem in the city’s humdrum life, but makes one from its sounds.” —Courant.com

“Reading Burt’s new collection, Parallel Play, you can’t help feeling it’s the world’s loss.” —Bookslut