Nearly a Caress: Last Poems

Nearly a Caress: Last PoemsJane Greer (1953 2025) was a poet, teacher, and founding editor of Plains Poetry Journal. This collection, her fourth, gathers the poems that remained unpublished or uncollected at the time of her death. They represent the ultimate refinement of her craft. "Greer left us too soon, but left us these wry, hard won, well wrought verses, witty and wise, that search for and find grace in unlikely places." A. E. Stallings, Professor of Poetry, Oxford

Jane Greer (1953-2025) was a poet, teacher, and founding editor of Plains Poetry Journal. This collection, her fourth, gathers the poems that remained unpublished or uncollected at the time of her death. They represent the ultimate refinement of her craft.

"Greer left us too soon, but left us these wry, hard won, well-wrought verses, witty and wise, that search for and find grace in unlikely places." -A.E. Stallings, Professor of Poetry, Oxford University

"In addition to wit and a knack for well-crafted language, Jane Greer had an eye for detail and a feel for the cosmic. These brief poems welcome all readers, and they welcome rereading and reflection. Nearly a Caress is a joy that polishes the legacy of a great American poet." -A.M. Juster

"These brief final poems of Jane Greer confront us with the sadness of farewell but a deeper promise of reunion that only love can foretell. How she conveys this in such heartfelt, unforgettable lyrics defines not only her art but her life." -Samuel Hazo, author, And More So

"As this exquisite final selection makes painfully clear, we have lost a poet who had been working at the height of her powers. Her craft was sharper than ever, as was her eye; the weight of her empathy was perfectly offset by the lightness of her touch, the perfect timing of her gentle humor. Each poem here reveals, without intruding, what we have all 'packed carefully away.' I sorely wish Jane Greer were still here, sorting through and making art of life's baggage." -Boris Dralyuk, editor-in-chief, Nimrod International Journal

"Among Greer's many gifts are extraordinary concision and precision, a seemingly effortless meter and a nimble facility with rhyme. These last poems are as tight and exact as origami, but what's most exciting in them is the animating voice. Every fold bends and breathes. They move and laugh and cry, and they sing about all that is beautiful, which will suffer and die and be lost, which will rise again-in these pages and beyond them." -George David Clark, editor, 32 Poems