Odd Mercy

For over two decades no one has equaled Stern''s compassionate surreal parables about the burden of and the exaltation at being alive.—Library JournalThe centerpiece of Gerald Stern''s ninth collection is a long poem titled Hot Dog named for a beautiful street woman who lives in and around Tompkins Square Park. Other characters in this poem are St. Augustine Walt Whitman Noah Gerald Stern himself and a ninety-year-old black preacher from the Midwest. In Hot Dog and throughout Stern wrestles with the issues—hope memory faith—that have always occupied him.