"… Am I the American indeed—I can't be entirely content, it seems, without some puzzlement, some sharpness, a bit of word-play, a kind of rhythm and music in however small a way…." Lorine Niedecker wrote Cid Corman the fifteenth of December 1966. (p. 85)

The New York Times daily crossword and Lorine Niedecker, however far from one another, occupy points on the same language circuitry. Words in both instances are devices used for amplification, switching, and detection—each one, in short, a transfer resistor or transistor. (p. 86)

Anyone who reads more than three poems by Lorine Niedecker will not fail to feel a need satisfied, or at least resolved. Perhaps only her own, but the work is of that order. The poems are short and relatively few, not so much perfected as complete in themselves. We know from her letters to Cid Corman she was slow before the task a...