Poetry. Winner of the 2007 Richard Snyder Publication Prize. "In her first book, Helen Wallace explores a range of subjects with lush language and a formal deftness that are deeply gratifying. If there is a presiding theme here, it is the tension between our struggle for precision' and the poignant fact of the imperfection all around and within us. Whether celebrating domestic life or evoking global concerns, Wallace captures the beauty in what is flawed and the flaw in what is beautiful. So much of what we love is born of loss, ' she tells us. And while the world Wallace renders is a broken one, in these poems it has been honed to brightness on the strop of her passionate sensibility. This is a wonderful debut"--Enid Shomer.