[That sophisticated craftsman, Stanley Kunitz] can commence a lyric with a couplet that might have been composed by one of the metaphysicals: "Lovers relentlessly contend to be / Superior in their identity:". Elsewhere he manipulates a parenthesis with the skill of Cummings, introduces the subliminal imagery of Roethke, sets down public ignominy in a witty shorthand similar to Auden's. But his poems would not be mistaken for theirs. In one, written "for money, rage, and love", on the theft of his wallet in a Roman tram, he speaks of wearing his heart "less Roman than baroque", and indeed, he does not shrink from a grand extravagance of language. He is concerned with the perennial themes of sexual love, death, and the self, and he is also alert to the shames of the century in which he explores these themes. There is a wide range in his work…. Like other...