In Beyond the Velvet Curtain, Karen Kovacik illustrates Czeslaw Miloxz's dictum that "e; the purpose of poetry is to remind us how difficult it is to remain just one person. "e; Peopled with such diverse characters as Richard Nixon, Nikita Khruschev, Kafka's father, Dorothea Lange, William Carlos Williams, Lawrence Welk, Robespierre, and a feisty Catholic saint, this original collection of poems takes us on an amusement-park ride through world history and art. Kovacik's poetry places us in the strange drama of cataclysmic events and ordinary life.