The Wanderers

ekphrastic poems by Barbara Krasner

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In this collection, poet Barbara Krasner wanders with the ghosts of her ancestors and master artists over past and present, contemplating life's work, appearances, and health.

ART / General   |   POETRY / General

ISBN: 978-1-971191-16-4 (print; softcover; perfect bound)

LCCN: 2026941996

100 pages; softcover; 29 full-color images

Henri Rousseau, Gwen John, Henri Matisse, Lily Furedi

Author Biography

Barbara Krasner holds an MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. The author of three poetry chapbooks, three novels in verse, and the ekphrastic poetry collection, The Night Watch (Kelsay Books), her work has also been featured in more than seventy literary journals, including ekphrastic poetry in The Ekphrastic Review, The Mackinaw: A Journal of Prose Poetry, MacQueen’s Quinterly, and Main Street Rag. She lives and teaches in New Jersey.

Endorsements

“Barbara Krasner’s poetic imagination, curiosity about art, and historical insights prove endless in this stunning collection. We are drawn in to paintings through words that bring them alive in ways we never thought possible. Every poem astonishes with detail and language. Krasner is one of the ekphrastic luminaries of our time.”
—Lorette C. Luzajic, founding editor of The Ekphrastic Review

“Barbara Krasner is a singular voice in contemporary poetry, as perceptive as she is prolific. With each new collection, I watch in awe as artworks are brought to life and imbued with new relevance. Krasner has a gift for showing us the emotional, philosophical, and political underpinnings of masterpieces that we only thought we knew. Bravissima!”
—Kristina Marie Darling, Fulbright Scholar; author of Daylight Has Already Come

“Barbara Krasner’s collection of ekphrastic poems in The Wanderers is superb. The book heightens perception and deepens a sense of interconnectivity across cultures and through time. From the streets of Amsterdam’s Jewish Quarter to New York City’s Lower East Side, responding to painters’ work as different as Mondrian and Frida Kahlo, Krasner’s poems tell stories that contrast human experience and encourage us to ask questions about what we see.

“The poems’ sensory details throughout the book bring paintings vividly to life. Krasner’s writing can make a cart’s rumble down a street feel physically audible, and an embrace of arms become an experienced presence. Krasner closely observes subtleties in subject matter and what they might suggest, carefully examining each painting, both abstract and realistic, with a sharp eye and distinctive voice. In some poems, such as ‘Royal Color Lines,’ written in response to Dauphin by Bridget Riley, Krasner treats the painting’s lines metaphorically, imaginatively interpreting them as contentions between lines of succession to the throne of France. In other poems, such as ‘Caravaggio in the ICU,’ after The Lute Player by Caravaggio, Krasner’s gaze contemplates what the painting might offer to one’s inner world in response to life’s personal challenges.

“Richly diverse in its concerns and perspectives, Krasner’s interplay between words and the visual world in The Wanderers engages readers in a wide variety of cultural textures and inspires a sense of our common humanity. Read The Wanderers and immerse yourself in the world’s textured brilliance and torn edges on a river of words from a writer who knows how to illuminate life. What an excellent book!” —Anna Citrino, author of award-winning Stories We Didn’t Tell

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