Pau-Llosa’s poetry makes intellectual demands from his reader, not so much aiming at abstractions as to make the concrete forms of poetic language intelligible. He honors his reader by not making concessions, all the while casting spells with an inventive prosody. In this, Pau-Llosa’s best work yet, one finds an evident joy in the craft of verse, masterful language put at the service of sustained reflections on the world’s, and life’s, wonders.