“Al Maginnes effortlessly merges the experimental and the metaphysical, the erotic and the spiritual. His wit, humor, and command of metaphor far surpass the fashionable, talky cynicism of his contemporaries.”—Peter Johnson

The speakers of these poems find themselves “coming to our destination / from the wrong direction.” And because we arrive from the wrong direction, we must witness the ruins of landscapes and people. Yet each of these catastrophes is balanced by the understanding that humans are contradictory creatures, capable of creating beauty as well as chaos.

Al Maginnes is the author of several collections of poetry. He teaches at Wake Technical Community College in Raleigh, North Carolina.