Solitude, solace, and consolation are among the themes explored in this poetry collection that considers the ways that language, loss, history, and memory are linked together. The centerpieces of this collection are two major poems--"Les Baillessats, " a relaxed, sunny poem written for a newborn son, and "The Sunflower, " an elegy for a father that is a technically dazzling extended meditation on death, family, and religious faith.