The poems in this collection are drawn from four earlier Carcanet titles: "At the Edge" (1977); "A Season of Calm Weather" (1982); "True Colours" (1990); and "The Stones on Thorpeness Beach" (1994), as well as previously unpublished work.
The book draws on over thirty years' writing. Of Powell's work, John Greening wrote in Poetry Review, "Powell catches the windy melancholy of East Angela, its loneliness, its rigor. His music is always delicately judged..."