In Carole Simmons Oles's fourth collection of poetry, small events of everyday life throw open a door to meditations on the absence of a husband, on the separation from children, and on the sustenance gained from friendship and the sorrow its loss. Each poem has an ambitious range, sure in its leap from subject to subject. "In Time, with Holsteins," for example, carries us from close observations on the daily life of cows to facts about Indian rites of penance and purification to worry about a friend's diagnosis of breast cancer.
Even as the poems take their strength from the personal, they are informed by a global concern, the poet's belief in a network of trust and obligation. "The Radioactive Ball" reflects this concern: