POLAROID

Extending her title's potent image, Hearne groups incisive glimpses of people, places, rites of passage, and assorted epiphanies under poetically descriptive headings: ``Outside,'' ``City Sights,'' ``Insights,'' ``Second Sight,'' ``Close-ups,'' ``Dark and Light,'' ``Long View.'' The outside views, like the title poem, are evocative and allusive—even here, there's more than meets the eye. But Hearne's forte is the inward-looking gaze—Penelope ruminating on Odysseus' homecoming—''Honor is the common core, like the dog/that waits beside the door...Can honor live with love, can love/survive the tests of self-respect?'' With deft touches of wordplay and wit, often rueful or quizzical but always thoughtful, an appealingly personal collection. Beautifully composed b&w photos of imaginatively appropriate subjects introduce each section. (Poetry. 12+)