The U.S. Poet Laureate from 2001 to 2003, Billy Collins here presents his ninth collection—named one of the Best Books of 2011 by Newsweek—at once ironic and elegiac, covering love and loss, life and death, youth and aging, solitude and union—but not without a mischievous sense of humor. In the title poem he writes: "Every morning since you disappeared for good, / I read about you in the newspaper / along with the box scores, the weather, and all the bad news. / Some days I am reminded that today / will not be a wildly romantic time for you."

"Collins writes of time and death with humor and whirligig images and wordplay so unexpected and delectable, reading his poetry is like watching a magician."—Booklist