"Set in locations from dive bars to Montparnasse Cemetery, from a ancient Greek temple to a tourist shop in Assisi, 'Exit opera' explores the ever-vexing issues of time, mortality, love, and loss, and considers the roles of art and human connection. Whatever their nominal subject--jazz, zombies, Buddhism, Siberian tigers--these poems make for a compelling mix of humor and pain, difficulty and solace"--Inside jacket flap

Exit opera -- Existential voyage -- 20.5 light years from earth -- Some of the questions to consider -- My opera -- Games people play -- Self-portrait as a goldfish trapped in a toilet -- Insomnia song -- Swoon -- Getting to know you -- In Assisi -- In the afterlife, -- Oracle at Delphi -- Self-portrait with a statue of Fernando Pessoa -- According to the Buddhists -- This too shall pass -- Jump in the river and drown -- Kansas, four A.M. -- Beatitude -- Blues on Avenue C -- Compassion problem -- Traces -- Another spring -- Bad motel -- Upstate -- Tidal -- Paris -- Unleaving -- Solace -- Night out -- Existential elegy -- Jazz in 20/20 -- Eschatology -- Divination -- Self-portrait with heavy rain -- Cracked logic -- Vanishing point -- Therefore I am nothing -- Predator report -- I believe this way of life is ending, I said -- Journey to the end of season one of "American horror story" -- Ode to England -- Transfer of power -- Ohio -- Distance -- Dark and getting darker -- Aria Di Sorbetto -- By way of a reminder