Breakers: New and Selected Poems
Poems by Paul Violi

"Breakers brings together several of this influential poet’s major, longer poems, and presents new work. Paul Violi has written poems in numerous nonpoetic forms: poems in the shape of an index of a book, a TV schedule, and the mooring plan of boats in a yachting marina are examples. He is also very funny and very serious, often at the same time. . . . We know by now that the postmoderns, whoever they are, level high and low culture, and can start a sentence on Mount Olympus and end on Canal Street". -Martin Stannard

Praise for Violi’s previous work:

"Violi’s work is academic, avant-garde, and amusing, which sounds like a pretty good definition of postmodernism to me." -Bloomsbury Review

"A member of the generation that came of poetic age in New York City in the 1960s, Violi has the offhand learnedness, the not-so-deadpan humor, and the experimentation that characterizes that loosely grouped school. . . . Violi’s poetry is deserving of, and would be enjoyed by, a wide audience." -MultiCultural Review

"Violi dances with, punches out, wrestles down, and jogs alongside language. It’s as if words were flowers for Violi. He can’t help picking them, arranging them." -Poetry Project Newsletter

"Deft, magical, filled with light as he makes light and thus lightens the load, Violi’s poetry is pure pleasure." -American Book Review