Michael Lieberman’s Some Dark Fire, New and Selected Poems

is a generous sampling of an exceptional poet’s mature work, written over almost thirty years—since Lieberman moved to Houston in 1988. His poems offer a perspective on our world that is in turn celebratory, somber, joyous, dark, tender, and, most of all, doubt-plagued. He offers no easy answers, but his questions will enrich and reward the reader. This deeply felt book is the work of a gifted poet and research physician at the height of his powers.

Lucky

Every heart conceals a few small secrets
or, if full of amplitude and plenty, large ones.
     
I begin with a green bough, forsythia—
supple and yellow with flower.
     
I end there—not because I am impoverished,
but because I have it all.