Before he started writing plays, many of which have been acclaimed internationally for their inventiveness and adventure, Frank McGuinness published poems in newspapers and magazines. Booterstown, his first collection, contains the fruits of his recent return to poetry.This compassionate and candid book moves impressively between sure, confident assertions and the brave, tremulous risks of uncertainties and wonder. Although it contains a number of elegies, Booterstown sings 'the glory of the body' and celebrates comforts and faiths constantly manifest in the human spirit. These are lovely gentle poems.Frank McGuinness was born in Buncrana, Co. Donegal, in 1953 and lectures at St Patrick's College, Maynooth.His own plays include The Factory Girls, Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching towards the Somme, Innocence, Carthaginians, Someone Who'll Watch Over Me and The Bird Sanctuary, and he has adapted plays by Lorca, Ibsen, Chekhov, Brecht, Strindberg and Pirandello.A me