"'Sand' is an apt title for this collection [of poetry], as sand is the essence of our regional soil, and one might easily assume that Al Bona too is an essence of our regional spirit--though of far greater complexity than sand. But sand is also an old word for grit--meaning grit of spirit, as in true grit. If a man had "sand," he had quiet toughness or tenacity. Or pluck. And here it is in these poems: the rich mix of quirky self-deprecation and feisty defiance, skilled stylistics tandemed with startling music, wide-ranging intellectual curiosity with a heart both quizzical and tender. Al Bona's poems are born in the regions of history, politics, philosophy and war, but come to fruition in the plain country of human frailty and hard questions. From Catullus to Ginsburg, he is fearless in subject matter, practiced in compassion, sharp of wit... In these poems we find the 'science' of the spirited mind, the 'magic' that happens when lyricism meets unflinching vision." --Anne-Marie Oomen, author of "Un-coded Woman" and "An American Map"
About the Author: Al Bona was born in Chicago in 1929. He enjoyed an idyllic early childhood wandering along the Des Plaines River and through the extensive Forest Preserves of Cook County, where he learned to identify more than 100 native birds by sight and sound. His childhood was unburdened by the knowledge that the United States and the entire industrial world was plunged, in the year of his birth, into a great economic depression. He struggled mightily to earn two degrees from the University of Illinois. By some administrative mistake, unexplained and unexplored, he was admitted into the graduate school of the University of Chicago, where he dreamed of getting a Ph.D. in philosophy and spending the rest of his days teaching Plato, Aristotle, Spinoza, Schopenhauer, etc. etc. This excellent plan was rudely interrupted by the draft, which put him into the Army and the Korean War. He began writing poetry and prose in Korea in 1953-54. After his discharge from the Army, he was for some time in a mental malaise, with no idea what he would do for a living. He was offered a job as a mortgage lending officer in a Savings & Loan Association, a subject about which he knew nothing at the time. He imagined he might spend a few years in this employment, but within three years the board of directors elected him president of the Association. Thusly he became a banker. Al lives with his wife, Barbara, near Northport in Leelanau County, Michigan.