Borrowing its title from astronomy, the counterglow is a faint light in the night sky that appears directly opposite the sun. Made up of interplanetary dust, this glow is difficult to detect unless one observes from a place without light. These lyric poems of Patricia Killelea speak from this darkness as she seeks a language of redemption-- some kind of brightness to cling to, however faint. Spanning terrains of spiritual and literal hunger, where ecological and personal crisis intertwine, this collection is an unwavering affirmation of the power of words in the face of wordlessness.