From Publishers Weekly
There has never been an American poet as public as Ginsberg. He bared?and dared?all: as Beat, as bohemian, as gay man, as Buddhist, left-winger, East Village stroller?greeting all with messages of peace, dissent and sex. Despite his unorthodoxies, he belonged very much to a culture he helped build. Above all he was a survivor (unlike many of his compatriots), a seemingly eternal and yet contemporary voice always fresh with headlines. This volume, to be published on the second anniversary of his death, is no throwaway compendium of scattered verses. Rather, it is a perfect capstone to a noble life; the authentic, unmistakably Ginsbergian nature of its themes ("God"; "Excrement"; "Butterfly Mind") mixes effortlessly with remarkably intimate renderings of his approaching death. Though diabetes and heart problems plagued his last years, Ginsberg was not told of his metastasizing liver cancer till a week before he succumbed, during which time he worked on his last poem, "Things I'll Not Do (Nostalgias)," which poignantly lists friends and places and dreamscapes that will be forever unvisited by him. Robert Creeley's short foreword is a dissertation in abstract, reminding us of the inimitable Ginsberg cadences?"no poet more heard, more respected, more knew the intricacies of melody's patterns." It is "the last mind," says Creeley, of "the enduring friend." And no friend of Ginsberg's will be without this book; no friend of American poetry should be either. Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
"If you've an ounce of strength, use it to look inside," Ginsberg says in a 1996 poem, written as his health was failing. Chronologically arranged and judiciously edited, this volume collects poems from January 1993 through March 1997. Built around Ginsberg's trademark concerns, we find explicit homosexual erotica, with parts of the body that are usually kept hidden brought to the forefront. But Ginsberg's tenderness and caring is also much in evidence, as in "New Stanzas for Amazing Grace," a song reaching out to the homeless. In 21 poems written during the final month of his life, Ginsberg captures the child's sense of enchantment, often turning to whimsical rhyme; whether it's five pages of couplets pointing out CIA involvement in drug wars or giving advice to readers in poetry slams, we're returned to a time when putting words on paper was pure enjoyment (assuming the reader can overlook extensive annotations). Every book by Ginsberg should be in most libraries, but this one is essential.?Rochelle Ratner, formerly with "Soho Weekly News," New YorkCopyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews
Pity the young reader who first encounters the famous Beat poet in this last volume written before his death in 1997. When they read Ginsbergs confession in Is About (Allen Ginsberg is about confused mind writing down newspaper/headlines from Mars), they wont know whether to laugh or feel sorry for this self-proclaimed pederast and Beat icon. Certainly, new readers wont realize that this entire collection is nothing less than an endless (and unintentional) parody of every form and trope from Ginsbergs long career. There are: the political rants about the CIA and repressive Amerika (Reverse the rain of terror on street consciousness U.S.A.); the quasi-Buddhist chantverse (Catholicism capish/Catholicism capish/Catholicism abortion capish/Capish capish capish); the biblical-Whitmanesque, long-line verse (Walking with aching back at base of spine, walked stiffly to kitchen/toilet to pee); the long, breathless bop prosody; and lots of childlike ditties and silly songs that prove once and for all that Ginsberg is not the second-coming of Blake. The title poem, a grandiose vision of his own funeral, catalogues his many lovers and samples the countless readers hes influenced. Old age and impending death inspire much scatology (Shit machine shit machine/Im an incredible shit machine), none of it Swiftian. Further evidence that the Beat Generation is a sociological phenomenon (not an artistic one) that loses its bite out of its historical context. What might have shocked and entertained in the '50s, here seems the sad and pathetic ravings of a dirty old man. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Book Description
Allen Ginsberg was one of the bravest and most admired poets of this century. Famous for energizing the Beat Generation literary movement upon his historic encounter with Gregory Corso, Jack Kerouac, and William Burroughs in mid-century New York City, Ginsberg influenced several generations of writers, musicians, and poets. When he died on April 5, 1997, we lost one of the greatest figures of twentieth-century American literary and cultural history. This singular volume of final poems commemorated the anniversary of Ginsberg's death, and includes the verses he wrote in the years shortly before he died.

Card catalog description
Famous for energizing the Beat Generation literary movement upon his historic encounter with Gregory Corso, Jack Kerouac, and William Burroughs in mid-century New York City, Ginsberg influenced several generations of writers, musicians, and poets. This volume of final poems commemorates the anniversary of Ginsberg's death, and includes the verses he wrote in the years shortly before he died.

About the Author
Allen Ginsberg was born in 1926 in Newark, New Jersey, a son of Naomi Ginsberg and lyric poet Louis Ginsberg. In 1956 he published his signal poem, Howl, one of the most widely read and translated poems of the century. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, awarded the medal of Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et Lettres by the French minister of culture in 1993, and co-founder of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa Institute, the first accredited Buddhist college in the Western world, Allen Ginsberg died on April 5, 1997.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Allen Ginsberg was one of the bravest and most admired poets of this century. Famous for energizing the Beat Generation literary movement upon his historic encounter with Gregory Corso, Jack Kerouac, and William Burroughs in mid-century New York City, Ginsberg influenced several generations of writers, musicians, and poets. When he died on April 5, 1997, we lost one of the greatest figures of twentieth-century American literary and cultural history. This singular volume of final poems commemorated the anniversary of Ginsberg's death, and includes the verses he wrote in the years shortly before he died.

Author Biography: