[Thomas Kinsella is a] restless soul who can do many things well. In Nightwalker he appeared to have found his stride, the event which ought to mark a happy origin, but, unfortunately, in his new collection [Notes from the Land of the Dead and Other Poems] Mr. Kinsella is trying hard to sound ordinary. He does this perhaps in deference to those contemporary canons of taste which favor vividness at any cost: but the cost is at least worth measuring. "Dither in and out of a mother liquid", "forkfuls/of scrambled egg", "cooped up/with the junk of centuries", "blanched: appalled", "sweat stood out/at the roots of my hair!" all get into the first page of his book. No doubt Mr. Kinsella wishes to chronicle the detritus of the everyday as it flows in upon him, but the poor result for his diction makes him a casualty...