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Author of twelve collections of poetry, a Pulitzer Prize finalist, founder of the New England Review and a former Vermont Poet Laureate, Lea, in the here and now, chronicles both vast and minute aspects of human experiences. Life isn't easy, and we're all scarred, traumatized to some degree. What is to be done? Lea responds in illuminating verse that expresses a reckoning with emotions that linger like ghost in the bardo, hesitant to move on, having one more thing to say. In Spilled Milk, a father remembers the pain inflicted on his daughter over an insignificant accident, her child's face distraught: By worry, which it should have been my fatherly duty / To soothe. In a little gem titled Memo for 2027: A Love Poem, the poet tells his future self to count that blessing, maybe count it more, referring to a wife still loving, children and grandchildren, and The way late winter's sun make wondrous shadows on / The snow out there. This radiant collection will leave readers counting their blessings past, to come, and most certainly right here.--Raúl Niño Copyright 2010 Booklist

Lea (No Doubt the Nameless) weaves a graceful tapestry of personal history while expressing his trademark wonder at the natural world in his quietly powerful 13th collection. His memories are not grand in scale; he recalls watching his daughter spill a glass of milk on a train, teaching his son to ride a bike, and schoolboy shenanigans such as a "slew of idiot tricks" pulled on a Latin instructor--yet these scenes become significant through Lea's telling. In "Cavaliers," the poet recalls spending a night in the hospital after suffering chest pains, and sharing a room with a man who had been there for a month: "How long, I mused, can a person be patient?" This poem gives way to "Gratitude," in which Lea musters tolerance for petty inconveniences, like taking the dog to the vet or shoveling snow, viewing these acts as gifts. Interspersed with Lea's musings on his life are his luminous descriptions of the world around him, including the "elegance and composure" of a flock of circling vultures, and a first blush of spring "with snowdrops glinting, the freshets making their evanescent cascades through the woods." The refrain of aging and death echoes throughout and is tempered by Lea's gentle optimism and appreciation for every facet of life. These poems provide readers with a potent antidote to hopelessness. (Sept.)