This is an esoteric collection that will appeal to those with eclectic tastes. It contains three works: The Tao of the Chessboard, Forty Years in Haiku, and Endgame: Selected Poetry.
Tao spans the first seventy-five pages. The left-facing pages each contain one chess diagram that serves as a puzzle that can be solved with either side to move. The right-facing pages provide twenty-three stanzas “that explores the manner in which the Tao expresses itself through the sixty-four squares.” The author writes, “These stanzas are about the long journey, the ‘ten thousand steps’ that make up our lives. The Tao of the Chessboard is an invitation to mastery and this call extends even to the reader’s spirit.”
Forty Years is “akin to a spiritual autobiography that is intimately linked to nature and geography,” while Endgame is “a gathering of different verses covering a wide range of themes … an offering for the altar of Polyhymnia.” Anyone who has enjoyed the works of Stefan Gerzadowicz may well enjoy this volume, which draws on a wide variety of philosophical and religious sources.