Michael Ondaatje has called Sharon Olds's poetry 'pure fire in the hands' and ch
eered the 'roughness and humour and brag and tenderness and completion in her wo
rk as she carries the reader through rooms of passion and loss'. This rich selec
tion - made by the author - exhibits those qualities in poem after poem, reflect
ing, moreover, an exciting experimentation with rhythm and language and a moveme
nt toward an embrace beyond the personal. Subjects are revisited - the pain of c
hildhood, adolescent sexual stirrings, the fulfilment of marriage, the wonder of
children - but each re-casting penetrates ever more deeply, enriched by new per
ceptions and conceits.
