"Raw anarchistic energy and powerful intellectual control . [Gunn's] existential rebelliousness was tempered by a sense of our common humanity." -- Edward Hirsch, The Washington Post Book World "Almost all of Gunn's virtues are on display [in Boss Cupid ]: his playful metrical dexterity, his unflinching celebration both of beauty and of its transience." -- Paul Gray, Time "Gunn allows his patterns of meter, rhyme and stanzaic form to emerge organically from the material . One can almost follow this happening on the page, observation finding its proper rhythm, emotion its spiritual level, the poet discovering new moods, new modes of reflection." -- William Deresiewicz, The New York Times Book Review "The tone of sadness Gunn strikes so repeatedly and so well is always mixed with something else, and it's the combination that makes the poetry human and distinct. I feel, reading Thom Gunn, that I am in touch with the complete person--a man lustful but not childish, loving but not deluded, sad but not overcome." -- Reed Woodhouse, The Boston Book Review.