The Guest Touches Only Those Who Prepare

Edward L. Edmonds is a professor of English at the University of Prince
Edward Island.

Familiar events in “earth’s diurnal course,” common (and
occasionally not-so-common) artifacts, birds, insects, beasts, flowers
of the field, and natural phenomena are all subjects for Gates’s muse.
His metaphors, often vividly compressed, become symbols for his own
reflections, subconscious memories, emotions, innate views on life. Like
stones dropped in a still pool, they awaken ever-widening ripples of
response in the sensitive reader’s mind. One recurrent theme is the
closely felt relationship between that driving elemental force in the
earth below and the varied growth forms assumed above. A favorite image
of his is the tree. Many of his poems have a richly autobiographical
flavor. He has an astonishingly perceptive eye for even the minutest
detail. He also has a penetrating power of phrase. All short poems need
a strong first line for immediate impact: consider Shakespeare’s
sonnets, for example. Gates’s poems excel in this, whether in verse or
in prose format.

This slim, modestly priced, and nicely printed volume includes a number
of poems that first appeared in various journals.