ROBERT BENSE'S voice conveys a kaleidoscope of human emotion set against vivid imagery in this beautiful book of poetry. Backed by a vast geographic landscape, Bense paints a picture for the reader of the everyday in not-so-everyday locations. His is a life well traveled, and he weaves a tapestry of places both ordinary and extraordinary, uncovering the simple pleasures and pains that we all experience. In "Leveled Out," he reminisces about a place that once was. "I never go back but think of things we left behind. Your footsteps on the bricks. Fugitive prints of bodies lying in the orchard grass. Clues gone stale explaining us to us." Arguments in a Public Space is a poetic delight.