Henri Matisse, Drawings 1936

A collection written over fifty years, Makes You Stop and Think is the latest work from the accomplished and renowned poet Daniel Hoffman. "The sonnet is a sacred // vessel, it takes a civilization / to conceive its shape or know / its uses," the poet Louise Bogan told "a crowd of bearded youths" and "rumpled girls." Hoffman's harvest of half a century's sonnets shows the richness and power of their form. These poems revel in exploring memory and feeling: For reality is vintage and delicious Especially when you taste it while it brews Because it comes as love comes, heart-skip sudden, Yet long as a lifetime in a once past wishes, A gift you couldn't have the wit to choo