The vibrant nexus of second-generation New York School poetry is celebrated for its intellectual rigor, wit, startling imagery and lyrical beauty. At the centre of that generation of influential New York poets is the work of Tony Towle, Charles North and Paul Violi. Here they are recognised for the poetic power of that work and their personal long commitment to the demanding life-in-poetry. In these critical portraits we meet them as young men finding their way, emotionally, philosophically and psychologically hooked on poetry, indeed radically changed by the work that may have literally saved their lives.