It is quite commonplace when describing a new volume of poetry to resort to stock, albeit wholly appropriate, descriptors. “Stunning” and “dazzling” come immediately to mind. So, too, “compelling.” I’m sure I’ve used such phrases myself, and would now when writing about Asterism, were this book not so fresh that it makes one self-conscious of, and encourages the reader to want to lean away from, anything resembling the familiar. The range in theme would be impressive enough on its own, but what sets this collection apart is how the author is able to pull off legitimate experimentation while remaining accessible. The poems both invite and challenge the reader. Here is a poet as intelligent as any other, but whose intelligence is never the point of the poem. Not to mention the language is downright gorgeous. Perhaps what is most striking about the collection is the apparent ease with which the author moves between registers and modes. At times personal, at others political; slipping back and forth between lyric and narrative; drawing on various languages and geographies, Asterism is a collection of both grace and grit, the work of a mind at work—in, and on, a world that is simultaneously expanding and contracting.
—from the Judge’s Citation by John Murillo