In his third collection of poems, Daniel Anderson ponders and
celebrates the images, sounds, and tastes of contemporary life.
The poems in The Night Guard at the Wilberforce Hotel navigate the
evanescent boundaries between the public and the private self. Daniel
Anderson's settings are often social but never fail to turn inward,
drowning out the chatter of conversation to quietly observe the truths
that we simultaneously share and withhold from one another--even as we
visit friends, celebrate a young couple's union, or eavesdrop on the
conversations of others.
These twenty poems include meditations on teaching hungover
undergraduates, wine tasting among snobs, and engaging the war on terror
from the comfort of the suburbs. They are alternately driven by
ornamental language that seeks to clarify and crystallize the beauties
of our common world and the poet's faith that fellowship ultimately
trumps partisanship. Even as they weigh and measure the darkness of the
heart and the sometimes rash and stingy movements of the mind, the poems
refrain from pronouncing judgment on their characters. As much as they
ponder, they also celebrate in exact, careful, and loving terms the
haunting and bracing stimuli from which they originate.