Like water spilling over stones, these poems seem to bubble up from the depths. ''Uncaged by calendars and watches'', one character retreats into rainforests, another explores the world barefoot seeking ''life's wild handful of quiver and piss.'' A twelve - year - old shoots a rattlesnake, an octogenarian pulls vines in the public park. Wolves travel in a van inspiring dreams of ''the boundless rush and yap of belonging'' and a whale offers solace on a balmy night on the Coral Sea. These are luminous reflections on the complex and sometimes fraught relationships between society and the natural world.