"Alicia Suskin Ostriker's passionate voice has long been acknowledged as a vital force in American poetry. From urgent spiritual quest to biting political satire, from elegy to comedy, from celebration of the city street and the world "as a paradise might be / if we had eyes to see," to the "crack in earth . . . crack in her mind," from brilliant evocations of art and music to mother-daughter wrestlings, Ostriker's poetry rings with insistence on beauty and truth. Drawing from six of her previous books, and highlighting a sequence of bold new poems exploring the challenges and absurdities of aging, The Volcano and After is a masterpiece for our time. OLD WOMAN AT THE RIVER On the bank of the river I slide inside my sleeping bag sleep is good if I am not kept awake by coughing the sound of the water soothes time passes and does not pass when I am better I will sit and meditate for a while there may be birds to listen to then I will step down the bank and put my naked foot in the water which will shock at first, being so cold, so swift."--