Charm bracelet, definitely, the one

she hardly wore, and cheap gold flats

that made her look young and men look twice

-- we know we're in the presence of a sharp observer of life's uncanny, resonant moments. The poems are rich with the rueful thoughts and humor that come with middle age, and with the sometimes surprising gorgeousness of the ordinary ("O how beautiful... a casual fall of light that strikes and spreads/ on enameled aluminum siding, brick, /spangled stonework..".). Di Piero writes touching poems about his own love affairs, and evokes the days of "White Blouse White Skirt", when his parents strolled hand in hand on the boardwalk, "walking toward me, / it seems, into breezy life, / where they don't know I'm waiting". But he also captures the channel-surfing feel of contemporary culture: he sees Vermeer's "Girl With Pearl Earring" in a fair, nose-studded girl at the ATM machine, describes a UFO sighting, recreates the song of a panhandler in Port Authority.

Di Piero is a poet of both emotion and thought; of both high art and cheap gold flats. He speaks with plainspoken directness, by turns reserving and delivering lyrical tenderness.