Drawing equally on Buddhist sutras and country blues, William Fuller’s Sadly derives compassion from its ironic vision. Quick and sometimes elusive, these poems observe fluctuations in the weather, economic markets, and human consciousness. In the Chicago Tribune, Maureen McLane has written of Fuller’s “dense, elliptical meditations,” finding “luminous images that consistently marry the cerebral and the sensual.”

“Fuller’s poetry, ‘Ankle-deep in / twittering stunt codes / and moral pucker,’ has ‘The Feels.’ And unashamedly so, as he explains: ‘If we cannot refer to what doesn’t exist / then I'll stop talking to you now.’ It is a rare condition; causing his lines to exceed their own grasp and ‘go dancing round / the cold clear talk you almost reach beyond.’ Despite the confession that ‘the nonexistence of essences is a pain in my heart,’ these poems remain confident of ‘the insubordination of many / thousand aggregates swirling up the light pole.’ And they generously share that confidence with the reader in return for a politic hope: ‘if we could only stand back / as they rather than us.’ Hitting the marvelous heights of his earlier collection Aether, Sadly finds Fuller ‘sloping toward heaven / but not parasitic on it.” —Simon Perril