Matthew Abuelo’s is a head-spinning depiction of harshest reality in New York City. Reading his sequence of poetry and stories is like “visiting the world of the forgotten.” In subway tunnels, psychiatric wards, and single occupancy rooms are individuals depicted in such brutal honesty by Abuelo that the reader cannot turn away or forget. Those of us fortunate enough to live “ordinary lives with ordinary fears” won’t easily file away this writer’s images–a “shut-in” dreading an eviction notice, a depressed tenant conceding “the instinct to survive but with no will to live,” a suicidal pedestrian for whom no cab stops. is poetic recognition of lives cordoned off from meaning by urban excess and corruption. Through his searing poems and unflinching narratives, Mathew Abuelo speaks for those who know “the voice can become a severed limb.” His stark reminder of desperation just up the block or down the hallway is a jolting call for compassion. — , author of and the Texas Revolution trilogy and With the opening lines of his new book, , Matthew Abuelo asks “What do you see? / What do you see when you lift the drawn shades?” What lies in the poems and stories beyond the drawn shades is the universe of Mr. Abuelo’s New York–its gutters, its streets, its skyscrapers–its people and their stories. It is a dizzying and urgent universe rendered in language just as urgent. These are words that will “dance forever” and “never die.” I have the privileged of reading yet another amazing work by Matthew Abuelo! will take you on a colorful, yet deep, deep as a midnight sky, ride. The ever turning spiral of emotions are filled in every line, stanza and verse as you are brought high and then downward again. The love of a city that is wrapped up in the arms of an old lover, that is slowly deteriorating around some while flourishing around newfound mistresses of whose sole purpose is to dine on the fatted-calf. Matthew paints a glorious picture with words as he shows the side of the “city that never sleeps” that very few and only those true professionals who keep the midnight oil burning long after midnight ever see. I highly recommend reading and following this profound writer. I look forward to interviewing him again very soon.” aka Art Sees Diner