Middle-aged male poets

Haxton ’s new collection, “Nakedness, Death, and the Number Zero,“ does contain several powerful pieces, primary among them some notably solid love odes. But taken as a whole, this is a disappointing collection. Although Haxton weaves together wildly disparate structures and voices — high lyrical and low cynical, overstuffed short story and spare ode to the moon — the book ends by seeming scattershot rather than wide-ranging, lacking an authoritative charisma that would make the poems memorable rather than merely smart. (incl. first chapter)

/ NYT 30.12.01*)