In a Boston Review article (Vol. 29, October-November 2004) titled “Not Your Father's Formalism,” the critic Rafael Campo offers interesting commentary on contemporary poets writing in formal verse. Campo contends that poets like Warren are not quite as strict as the formalists of long ago, but neither are they as loose as many contemporary experimental writers. Campo addresses Warren's Departure as well as new volumes by Marilyn Hacker and Mimi Khalvati.

When Warren's mother, Eleanor Clark, was diagnosed with macular degeneration, she reacted with shock and despair. But she also used her permanently impaired eyesight as inspiration for Eyes, etc.: A Memoir (1977). Clark's near-blindness and later decline into dementia were the source for several poems in Departure, and this autobiographical book by Clark is a stirring account of the brave and determined battles she waged in later life.

Deborah Digges, a poet...