The Short Fall from Grace

By Stewart Florsheim

WINNER OF THE 2005 BLUE LIGHT BOOK AWARD

Stewart Florsheim was born in New York City, the son ofrefugees from Hitler's Germany. He has received severalawards for his poetry and has been widely published inmagazines and anthologies. He was the editor of Ghosts of theHolocaust, an anthology of poetry by children of Holocaustsurvivors (Wayne State University Press, 1989). He wrote thepoetry chapbook, The Girl Eating Oysters (2River, 2004). He alsowrites non-fiction. Stewart's day job is in the technical writingfield. He also sits on the board of directors of Compassion andChoices of Northern California, an organization that helps theterminally ill make end-of-life decisions. Stewart lives in the SanFrancisco Bay Area with his wife, two daughters, and dog.

The following poems appeared in Round Table, 1986: "The GirlEating Oysters," "The Jewish Singles Event," "The Best Breadin Montparnasse"

"The Jewish Singles Event" appeared in Ghosts of the Holocaust(Wayne State University Press, 1989) and in Unsettling America: Race and Ethnicity in Contemporary American Poetry (VikingPenguin, 1994)

"The Kitchen Sink" appeared in Karamu, 1993 (under the title,"The Hotel Albert, 1969") and in Slipstream 19, 1999

"My Father's Autopsy" appeared in DoubleTake, 2:4, Fall, 1996

"Recent Findings, 1996" appeared in And What Rough Beast: Poems at the End of the Century (under the title, "RecentFindings") (The Ashland Poetry Press, 1999)

"The Only Jew in Oswiecim" appeared in Poetry on the Akeda asModern Midrash by Rabbi Steven Chester, 1999

"Exposed" appeared in Rattle 14, 2000

"Thirst" appeared in 88, A Journal of Contemporary AmericanPoetry, Issue 1, December, 2001 and Compassion and ChoicesMagazine, Volume 4, Number 1, Spring, 2005

"Survival" appeared in the Seatttle Review Volume XXV, Number1, 2002

"Retribution" appeared in Poetica, 2003

"Initiation" and "The Unseen" appeared in Full Circle, Volume1, Issue 6, 2003

"Mr. S" and "Once, After Swimming" appeared in The 2RiverView, Winter 8.2, 2004

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1595409823
• ISBN13: 9781595409829
• Release Date: April 2006
• Publisher: 1st World Library
• Length: 120 Pages
• Weight: 0.41 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Poetry of illumination

In his often heartbreaking honesty, Stewart Florsheim sheds light -- and grace -- on the people of his difficult childhood. Survivors of unspeakable horrors, they were ill-equipped to nurture. But fortunately for the reader, Florsheim survived his own dark times with the help of a poet's soul and remarkable gifts. He uses those gifts to tell of his own passage into adulthood. Florsheim's unflinching examination of his sorrows, struggles and unanswered questions encourages us, through the beauty of its language, to do the same. And in the process to offer grace to the people of our lives -- and to ourselves. His glimpses of romance, marriage and fatherhood are treasures. This is a book to cherish and to share.

Another fabulous anthology from Mr. Florsheim

Stewart Florsheim's latest anthology of poetry is inspired his adult life, works of art, music and writing, his family of origin and his formative years. I find his poetry in the latter category to be the most compelling. In "The Short Fall From Grace", Florsheim gives us another glimpse into not only his life, but also into the lives of his parents. The result can be compared to the phenomenon of gawking at an accident scene. We want to see the carnage and learn the details yet we are startled by and want to look away from those same things. Mr. Florsheim's German Jewish parents settled in New York City, where they worked, raised a family, and eventually, died. Their marriage was difficult, and the dynamics are described in many of the poems. Mr. Florsheim also chronicles the slow and painful death of his mother from ALS, and in his words, I sense the agony of the disease. This is an antholgy you would likely read many times over, finding new meaning and depth of emotion in each reading.

Poetry Worth Reading

Book Lady Review, Bonanza Books,Clayton California, June 19, 2006, Is poetry what we really want to read? Today, in our busy lives, when serious blocks of reading time are hard to come by, it seems to me that poetry is exactly what we ought to read. Take any poem in Stewart Florsheim's new book, The Short Fall From Grace, and what you get for a one page read is a world of past, present and future. Beneath the surface of dense yet accessible language is a world that is as much ours as the poet's. In the poem, Five Years Old, we see a tough little kid leaving (by himself) his hospital bed the day after his tonsillectomy, only to meet his mother in the revolving door of the hospital entry. They go around and around until the boy's laughter is silenced by his mothers frantic, angry words, "Don't you ever do this to me again." Of course the boy will. The boy must do it again, just as we have done it to our mothers. And we know at the close of the poem that our children will do it to us. One poem. One page. Whether Florsheim writes about his life or, as in many of the poems in this book, about artist-captured moments on canvas, each poem is its own story. Read them again while carpooling, train commuting, or waiting your turn at the dentist. Florsheim's knack for that jolt of understanding just below the surface makes these poems almost photographic. Believe me, you'll hear the "click" of the camera. We see what the poet sees, and because Florsheim's language has the light of insight, it is enough for poet and reader.