Players in the Dream, Dreamers in the Play

Shapiro's transcendent poems explore the turbulent space between uncertainty and acceptance, hesitation and stillness, and desperation and hope - a compelling kaleidoscopic arabesque. She shows us the depth and power of life. As these poems press against the nature of things toward a fusion of self, our timid wishes become greater truths.

Lori Romero, Cezanne's Carrot



Marian Kaplun Shapiro has created a body of work that asks to be read first for its content, second for the musicality of its words. Her line breaks speak of the musician within; to the specific way she hears poetry before it is committed to paper. She observes the world of nature, often human nature, with an awareness that never intrudes or possesses. There is a sense of someone who has heard dark secrets, who inhabits life's precarious cycles with us; yet forgives all weaknesses, ours and her own. I have my favorite poems, but each reader will choose differently, like choosing a song or a lover, carefully, listening for each nuanced word.

Colette Jonopulos, Tiger's Eye



Players in the Dream, Dreamers in the Play is a very, very smart book of poems. One is immediately reminded by the title of D.W. Winnicotts's groundbreaking work in psychoanalysis. And yet, though composed by a psychotherapist, they are clearly stories of real people going through the throes of living - and making a conscious? choice to view the world with (at least) one eye on redemption. What appears effortless to the poet--transiting from the experimental - to lyric -to narrative poems--would be very very difficult for a lesser poet to even attempt, let alone succeed so admirably--as in the journey from the poems "Monkey Mind" and "The Sculpture Garden". Terrific work illuminating creative writing as a rite of passage to both self-discovery and resistance."

Robert Nazarene, founding editor, MARGIE/The American Journal of Poetry



Shapiro's work is a marriage of intellect and feeling, as is her development of unique forms of poetic expression. Her use of form and language cannot be separated from her poetic intent, nor from her beliefs about the world and its cruelties and beauty.

Peter Schwartz, editor of the eye