A journey through layers is the progression Gordon Walmsley describes in this collection. One of the layers is the home of his birth and of his childhood, New Orleans, itself a place of many layers and obscurities. But there are others. There is the complexity of the drama of this world "as though what transpires/ were a play solely for my benefit, / as though there was something I was supposed to understand". A great storm brought New Orleans back to the writer, who has lived for many years in Europe. Brought him back, but did not keep him, for there are other layers he must penetrate.
