SOURCE: Herd, David. “Cooked or Over-Cooked?” Times Literary Supplement, no. 4979 (4 September 1998): 23.

In the following review, Herd examines the poems in Sweet Machine, alleging that Doty's verse is polished, confessional, and reminiscent of other poets such as Robert Lowell, Paul Muldoon, and Frank O'Hara.

In “Murano”, Mark Doty's poem about a Cornell box and the Venetian glass industry, the poet reflects on how the artist and the city shed light on one another. “I'd never have understood / the Cornell”, he remarks

                                                  if I hadn't seen it                               in Venice: he's made 

this city's reliquary,                               perfect jewel-case to hold                                         an empire's knuckle bone. … 

By the same token, the achieved delicacy and inlaid power of the box furnish Doty with a way of describing the city:

capital of the made, dear,           where the given's smoked                               and polished, plucked 

from the ovens'                     chemical heats, beaten                               and gilded to glory … 

This, in turn, is...