"A book by Joseph Stroud is a rare and exciting event."-"The Bloomsbury Review"Joseph Stroud knows the value of taking one's proper time to write poems, and taking great care when presenting a book to the world. Stroud has published four books in forty years, and his work has earned a devoted audience, including Jane Hirschfield, Ted Kooser, and Jim Harrison. "Of This World "includes the best from Stroud's previous volumes, as well as a series of new poems and translations."The Georgia Review "observed that "Joseph Stroud moves easily from the concise to the voluptuous." He does this through various forms-compressed lyrics, longer narratives, odes, expansive prose poems. Informed by the qualities of clarity and compassion, and inspired by artists and writers as diverse as Li Po, Neruda, and Giotto, Stroud articulates a reverential attention to the world, and a commitment to revelations found beyond the self."Across the ravine from the mill house there's a grassy patchwhere gypsies keep a donkey tied to a tree. SometimesI'll cross the stream and bring him an apple, holding it outlike a rare jewel. He'll contemplate it, then take my wholehand into his lips as soft as suede, and I can't tell how hedoes it, but when his head lifts back, the apple has disappeared."Joseph Stroud is the recipient of the prestigious Witter Bynner Fellowship from the Library of Congress. His poems have been featured on National Public Radio, "Los Angeles Times," and "The Washington Post." He splits his time between Santa Cruz, California, and a hand-built cabin in the Sierras.