Stefano, Dante Di: Midwhistle

University of Wisconsin Press, paperback Publication Date: March 1, 2023 Publisher Marketing: “Midwhistle proves Dante Di Stefano ‘a child / of cello, air, & mint spears.’ In this refulgent homage, Di Stefano honors ‘what loves / have been thrummed forth & nurtured / into shining’ by poet William Heyen’s august work and person. Surely any reader will leave this book, as I did, more alert and alive, more ‘in love / with the gray undersides of / mulberry leaves & the way / the grass ekes toward twilight.’” —H. L. Hix Appearing on the first page of Dante Di Stefano’s Midwhistle, a flock of blackbirds braids its way throughout this book-length poem—an elegy to life itself. A sprawling, digressive love note to an unborn son, it is also a celebration of the life and legacy of poet William Heyen, a meditation on midlife, and an exploration of the food and fuel of poetry itself. Di Stefano travels through a controlled stream of consciousness as he examines the weights of joy and gr