“Mariano Zaro’s seventh book of poetry, The Weight of Sound, is steeped in the drama of impermanence, the inevitable loss of all sentient beings—from the fragile butterfly to our own failing bodies. ‘I end where my body ends,’ Zaro writes in one poem, where a child pricks a finger, holding it outstretched, ‘like a candle or a lighthouse.’ As a child, the speaker tried to stave off the inevitable with pen and paper—’Each body labeled, organized, immutable.’ In these poems, the poet strives to hold on to what is departing, to what has already departed: ‘I call you by your name and all the names. / I call you by no name at all.’” —Blas Falconer, author of Rara Avis

El poema Padre Tierra es una conversación con la figura del padre. Una conversación que retrata al padre y a la vez, revela la identidad del hijo: sus miedos, sus descubrimientos y su paso de la infancia a la edad adulta.

These poems explore the author’s boyhood in a Spanish village, his coming of age and his arrival to California in his 20's. A series of characters marginalized by society interact with the speaker and help him understand his uniqueness and...

“And the reader cannot predict these surprising poems, that coax softly, and when less expected, break your heart.” ...

“With its memories of memories and wistful recalls, Three Letters is not the work of a fledgling poet. It comes from someone who has lived, remembered and regretted. ...

“It is a kind of passionate innocence in which Mariano Zaro writes. Each of these poems is an incandescent deep song of the senses.” ...

“In The House of Mae Rim, Mariano Zaro’s poems are like gentle apertures–quiet yet vivid as secrets whispered into the ear by a voice close by, then gone. ..

ANGLE OF REFLECTION features the work of ten award–winning Los Angeles poets with a remarkable 20–year history of working together. This luminous collection...