Hamer has a great ear for the sounds of his southern home town, and writes powerfully about family, slavery, and love. But the most striking aspect of these poems is the thinking that is going on behind them, and the open spaces he leaves for us to fill with our own feeling. Robert Hass wrote a very positive review in the Washington Post when this book first came out.

These poems are from Hamer's memories of his Southern Childhood, which are then woven into his dreams and insights of his present life in Northern California. He speaks of Vietna, the nature of evil and identity, both sexual and racial, his father's military life, family, and loss. These are moving, heartfelt, universal stories that only a poet of this talent call tell so well. This book will stay with you long after you put it down.