“By definition, wars are deadly and destructive. In Western societies at least, it takes little moral courage or imaginative reach to oppose such qualities. In aiming their fire at such easy targets as the warmongers who inflict horror on the innocent, many poets invite an interrogation: Do you accept that some wars may be necessary? If so, how do you choose which ones should be fought?” A new collection of anti-war poetry spends more time on the answers than one might expect, and as a result, actually packs a political punch at a time when many mainstream artists have been cowed into keeping their pacifist sensibilities to themselves.