Philosophy, suffering, and beauty come romping through this book, with the hard edge of observation. Cole Swensen achieves a rare poetic task assembling from the medieval past the stones of its identity.
—Barbara Guest

Drawing on hagiography, mathematics, apiculture, and other subjects, Swensen explores a period of cultural and political upheaval in which modernity emerges in the shift from theological to technological systems of knowledge … Swensen approaches theoretical concerns with refreshing forthrightness.—BK Fischer, Boston Review

… the poems do not make the mistake of trying to sound or look like facsimiles of 15th century poetry. They are thoroughly contemporary, disjunctive and paratactic. The further I got into the book, the more sense this choice made, as it seemed to reflect how our knowledge of the world of 15th century France was necessarily fragmentary, composed of brightly colored but disconnected pieces—Loads of Learned Lumber

Link to the book