You are about to meet a man by reading over forty years of his writings. In many ways, it is neither an easy introduction nor a comfortable journey. You will not be meeting the man as the person he is-you will be experiencing his process of becoming. The poems begin in the author's early youth, with strong narratives that recount an inherited persona of streetwise toughness. Some of these early poems define, some bruise, some shock. In their wake we find a boy taking his first puzzled steps toward manhood, carrying with him-almost without question-the legacy of a rough family layered with scar tissue from surviving street and dystopian surroundings. Following this chapter are the perspectives and experiences of late teenage years, college, military, life as a merchant seaman, professional musician, teacher, and as a single man. Each epoch is marked by often-painful collisions with others, whether they be rough-edged men or, all too frequently, the women the poet always needs but never seems to understand. At some point, age brings with it an appreciation for the essence of life and the part of human identity that exists beyond the tactile. The wisdom of this transformation is followed by a very different body of work-deeper and sometimes mystical in its meditation-a work of contemplation, acceptance, and an approach to inner peace. Seeing this book as the story of a poet, or of a man, would miss much of the work's meaning. It is more than a collection of poems, more than a life. What we have in Spirit Unchained is the autobiography of a soul.