Worth the Candle

Worth the Candle by Gary Glauber is a meditation on relationships and interactions in a life where sidewalks were his daily agenda. These accessible narrative and personal poems mix with both gratitude and a touch of melancholy to bring us into a world where we can see Life as souvenir / words as evidence / and a debit sheet that proves / the foolishness of / buying on margin. Here the present and past walk with us as we are guided into Glaubers poems -- poems crafted so we can experience the world through his nostalgic and thoughtful lens where these bright lights only last for so long. Kelli Russell Agodon author of Hourglass Museum and The Daily PoetGary Glauber has something to say and in Worth the Candle he says it with wit and style and linguistic fillips that can turn from plain to ornate in the spaces between commas. Many of his longish poems tell stories which seem both personal and universal both real and surreal and made so through the alchemy of language. My favorite opening here is the start of Graveyard Shift: The vagrant tree sprite / meets the head misfit / far along aisle five / next to a pyramid of cereal boxes.... They are searching for meaning / in this 24/7 universe. This is the poets function; this is the lure of Worth the Candle. Its clear Glauber has been paying attention and it shows on every page of this canny and beguiling collection. Corey Mesler author of Opaque Melodies that Would Bug Most People and Memphis MovieGary Glauber uses a double lens in Worth the Candle to present panoramic views of universal truths and close-ups of personal loss: like every life / worth knowing in detail / worth sharing en masse. In Controlled Procedure Glauber introduces a cardiologist who performs surgery on a woman who once rejected his love summing it up with a paradox: Through clearing an opening he gets closure. His ear is attuned to music both through the subjects of poems --Music Teacher Anthem Refrain An Octave Apart-- and through his use of devices such as alliteration: wizards in waiting sundry self-promoters short shrift society slant rhyme: brush ... touch morn ... warm and bleak ... screech and rhythms drawn from the drumbeat of my own heart. The reader is invited to join him in his journey to the place where I choose to keep singing / and I expect so will you. Beth Copeland author of Transcendental Telemarketer and Traveling Through Glass