The centerpiece of Gerald Stern's ninth collection is a long poem titled Hot Dog, named for a beautiful street woman who lives in and around Tompkins Square Park. Other characters in this poem are St. Augustine, Walt Whitman, Noah, Gerald Stern himself, and a ninety-year-old black preacher from the Midwest. In Hot Dog, and throughout, Stern wrestles with the issues--hope, memory, faith--that have always occupied him.