Description: What happened to Adam and Eve after they were expelled from the Garden of Eden? In John Engels' beautiful new collection of poetry, House and Garden, they move to a town resembling Burlington, Vermont, and set up a home, complete with a deck and garden. In their new location, they continue to pursue the task of naming creation, with varying degrees of diligence and introspection.

In a series of richly textured monologues, Adam and Eve don't know quite how to speak to each other, though each remains obsessed with thought of the other. Individual poems reflect their innermost thoughts as they go about the business of living through changing seasons and deep feelings of loss and yearning. Moving back and forth between the voices of Adam and Eve in a world now prey to time, change, and death, the poems explore the way the movement of seasons reflects both the flow of life and love between a man and his wife, and nature's tendency to move independently of their efforts to order it and name its parts.

House and Garden brims with the unforgettable imagery of "great flowers of the garden alive to the memory of light, " "the yellow dust of a dry sun, " "nights like breath stopping, " "the muddy fires of the Torment, " and "the dense quiet of an October rain." This eloquent volume enlivens the senses as much as it challenges heart, mind, and spirit.

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