The Horse Show at Midnight and An Afternoon of Pocket Billiards

This collection of twenty-four poems reveals the range and power of a young Southern poet whose work is characterized by a tensile strength and a coldly factual style which beneath the surface carries great passion. Some of the poems masterfully employ twists of irony; others utilize grotesque, yet real, characters and situations; others are nimble parodies. All of the poems, however, proclaim Taylor's sensitivity to the rhythms and idioms of everyday speech. All touch the unusual, the comic, the despairing, the hopeful. These, then, are distinctive poems about man and his condition, informed by reality and by a simple but powerful expression.