What is seen? What is concealed? What lies beneath the undercurrent, waiting for the unwary like broken glass on the river's floor? In this new collection, Nancy Susanna Breen examines questions such as these with impeccable attention to craft. She suggests that readers hold on tightly to precious moments, even the rarest, and even amid rage borne by "pent-up misery," the shock of flames, war, and homicide on nightly news, because, good people, they are all we have to "make tragedies endurable." This book is one to savor and keep near to read again. The poet brings us the gift of power through language, art that endures and its constant truth: Each of us carries "despair and hope in every cell."

Sandra Soli, author of two poetry collections, Silvering the Flute and What Trees Know (winner of the 2008 Oklahoma Book Award), and Who Will Tell the Story If Not You?, a workbook of prompts for memoir writing.