"Roses on the Gates of Hell" is author Michael DeAloia’s first published book of poetry. His collection forms an imagistic journey through the intensely personal and transforms a decade of personal experiences and textured observations into feats of creative imagination with clarity, precision and acuity. Crafted with a thoughtful and cadenced approach, the poems in this collection reach lofty heights while being grounded in the everyday. DeAloia’s meditative, and at times confessional, poems explore the wonder and torment of life, the impropriety of men and the inconstancy of women. DeAloia explores a range of topics: his subject matter varies from spirituality to social commentary to brooding introspection. The results are accessible but not trite, insightful but not pretentious, and well crafted but not overly flamboyant. DeAloia relies heavily on imagery, which becomes the cornerstone of the entire volume, and his verbal facility brings such a polish to these poems that the reader is left feeling that this book once opened must be finished. Michael DeAloia is a poet and essayist originally born in Dayton, Ohio but resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He holds a graduate degree from Case Western Reserve University and an undergraduate degree from Xavier University.

Michael DeAloia’s sophomore volume, Forever Mantras, continues his delicate negotiation between the clear and the cryptic, the concrete and the ephemeral, the comic and the elegiac. This splendid collection explores timeless themes of exploration, love, loss and identity that provide a window through which we can see our own lives. With a distinct voice, spare elegance and accessible language, DeAloia displays an unassuming trademark style, a selfless charm, playful wit and unexpected imaginative leaps that captivate and consume the reader.He possesses an exceptional gift for bringing images vividly to life, and his poems, overall, transcend the prosaic and banal and capture emotions to which all readers will be able to relate. Michael DeAloia is a poet, essayist and potent rainmaker originally born in Dayton, Ohio but resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He holds a graduate degree from Case Western Reserve University and an undergraduate degree from Xavier University.