Bite every sorrow

Whether honoring a dead friend or reveling in the lustful music of insects, whether on a Costa Rican bus "hot enough to contain all desire" or on a BART train abundantly full of experience and memory, whether delighting in the wacky wisdom of kids or ruing the silly hunger of adults, Ras's poems poke into unlikely nooks and invented crannies. Lines that find their start in the seemingly personal reach out toward questions that matter to everyone, how to laugh, how to hope, how to love.