Many of the poems focus on dogs and cats owned by the author, their personalities and role as loved companions to a writer’s solitary home life, set apart from the city and society in general. In a plain style, and with an engaging honesty and subtlety, the poems present the ordinary but precisely observed experiences of someone living without a significant other who has a grown daughter about to leave home. There are some poems that reflect on writing and the writing life, and a series of poems about living with cancer as well as dealing with chronic fatigue.