Form of Forms

The subject of the long poem that makes up Form of Forms is, to paraphrase poet Betsy Warland: Motherloss. It deals with the emotional and bureaucratic nature of adoption from the often bewildered and fractured point of view of someone who was, as an infant, given up for adoption. Now, as an adult, Goldstein is seeking information on the self through the layers and fields of forms one must look through to gain access to that information. These layers and forms are what make up the framework of the poem, and the reader is brought face-to-face with the slippery nature of identity as seen through the lens of adoption.