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Most people know Bruce Piephoff as a singer-songwriter.

But for Piephoff, who has released 18 albums, the music is only an extension of his true identity as a poet.

"I heard somebody say to Townes Van Zandt, 'You're a poet,' " Piephoff says. "And he said, 'Yeah, I am a poet, but then there is this music thing.' "

Piephoff is working on two albums, but he still found time to complete "Fiddlers and Middlers," his newest book of poetry that was hand-printed and bound by local bookmaker Susanne Martin.

Available in a limited edition of 50 copies for $200 each, this is the second book of Piephoff's poetry Martin published. It took her almost a year to hand-publish each page of the books.

"This wouldn't have happened if [Martin] hadn't approached me about doing a book," Piephoff says.

Martin says she and Piephoff met during their "Tate Street days" in the '80s while they were students at UNCG.

"He was an interesting character," Martin says. "And we had a lot of mutual friends."

She published his first book "Honkytonk Stradivarius" in 1995. Fourteen years later, she got the idea to make a second book of Piephoff's poetry when his wife, Laura, told her he had been working on new material.

"A sequel seemed logical because I just loved that first book so much," Martin says.

Piephoff gave Martin a stack of his poems, which she helped organize into four different sections. She also recruited Piephoff's son, David, to contribute his artwork to illustrate the book.

"It adds a whole other element of humor with the illustrations that are just a riot," Martin says. "I love the way he draws; it's real eye-catching."

As for the tone of the poetry, Piephoff says the material in "Fiddlers and Middlers" spans the time since the mid '80s. Martin feels the book is darker than their first collaboration.

"This is definitely more just being older and dealing with different sorts of things," Martin says. "And reminiscing and thinking back, talking about people who passed on."

"Ransom Notes" is a tribute Piephoff wrote to his longtime friend and freewheeling songwriter Billy Ransom, who was murdered in 2008. Piephoff writes: "Billy was a lovable, gentle soul who saved my bacon on several occasions."

"We made music together and traveled together over the years," Piephoff says of his late friend. "As we got older, we started moving in and out of each other's lives.

"We still saw each other from time to time, but in the early days, in our 20s, we used to hang out with each other every day and play music together."

Much of Piephoff's poetry could be described as free verse. He says he was inspired at an early age by beat poets and American laureate of free verse poetry Charles Bukowski.

"I was always used to reading real formal, real classical poetry in high school because those are the ones that are anthologized," Piephoff says. "And this guy (Bukowski) was writing about jobs that were very similar to what I was working and finding some kind of redeeming quality to it or light or beauty in ordinary people and ordinary stuff."

He says that one of the most interesting things about "Fiddlers and Middlers" was that Martin mashed yucca plants into the pulp she used to make the paper.

"I don't know if they were meant to symbolize anything unless folk singers are like growing weeds or something like that, but they did make a beautiful paper in the book," Piephoff says.

"You see all these yucca plants all around, and they make great paper, and I didn't want the paper to be too pristine," Martin says. "I kind of like the roughness about it, which kind of goes with the poetry."

She later added: "Bruce is scruffy, and all of us that have made it from that time are a little rough around the edges."

Contact Joe Scott at movieshowjoe@gmail.com