SOURCE: A review of House, Bridge, Fountain, Gate, in America, Vol. 134, No. 8, February 28, 1976, p. 165.

Below, Ferrari praises House, Bridge, Fountain, Gate for its "finely crafted structures" and "powerful, personal images."

Maxine Kumin won the Pulitzer Prize for her poems in Up Country in 1973. House, Bridge, Fountain, Gate, her newest collection, will not disappoint those who enjoy solid poetry that values life despite all its pain.

Two things seem immediately important: her dedication to her personal and poetic comrade, Anne Sexton, who took her own life in 1974, and her opening quotation from Rilke: "It may be as the poet has said, we are only here to say: House, Bridge, Fountain, Gate."

The dedication to Anne Sexton is particularly significant. I have read both women's works and have known each of them slightly, and I find in Kumin's latest poems a more Sexton-like directness. Though she still celebrates the positive...