Some Perfect Year

Cameron Gearen's first full-length collection of poetry, Some Perfect Year, opens with a poem entitled Invitation, and it's one we should heed. "Come with stones and a selectively green car. / I've set aside a weekend for crying and sleeping," the poem begins. Indeed, it would be a treat to spend a weekend or longer with this book. Crying might result as some of the subject matter is heavy, but Gearen leads us to a tentative redemption in the end: her final poem, called Aubade, mentions "the morning's promise," and foretells a more sanguine future.