Assorted Selfscriptings 1964-1985 is a selection of Eugene Stelzig’s poetry from five manuscript volumes. The poems are expressions of moods and states of mind of a changing self—or more accurately, selves. They are traces or scraps, remnants or remainders and reminders of them. Through these often confessional and autobiographical verses, Stelzig speaks to the states of mind and moods all pass through in life’s perennial journey. The issues these poems touch on are at once intimately personal as well as engaged with the politics of daily life and the larger world we all inhabit.

Fleet of (poetic) foot, these poems of the “romantic spirit” turn and turn again with wit and wisdom alike, drawing variously from classic literature and a well-lived life to deliver their charm and insight. These are poems to make you feel the heart’s beat and ache—and to make you remember the head believes it rules the heart.

Reviewed by: Lytton Smith