Book excerpt: "In this illuminating collection of prose, Dan Beachy-Quick broaches "a hazy line, a faulty boundary" between our daily world, "where we who have appetites must fill our mouths, we who have thoughts must fill our minds," and another side, "within the world and beyond it, where appetite isn't to be sated, where desire is not to be fulfilled, and where thoughts refuse to lead to knowledge." Touching on the works of Emerson, Thoreau, and Proust, among others, Beachy-Quick explores the problem of duality -- the separation of the mind and body, word and referent, intelligence and mystery -- striving throughout to overcome this false separation, and to celebrate the notion that "wonder is the fact that the world has never ceased to be real." Combining a rich critical intelligence and the lyricism that has made him "one of America's most significant young poets" (Lyn Hejinian), Wonderful Investigations is a wonder unto itself"--Front flap.