And the thing about repression is if you dam the waters long enough, when they break get ready for floods. (“Clarification”) Fanning through Paula Varjack’s collection, Letters I Never Sent to You, two features imprint on the brain. The first is a photograph (the only one in the collection) of a clumsy heart mown into Read More
Over the last four decades Valerie Gillies has truly inhabited the Scottish and Irish landscapes; she draws from them a perpetual source of sustenance for her work. “The Cream of the Well” refers to the first sip taken at sunrise that was believed to have healing properties – a mystical quality which has a strong Read More
If you remember where you were on the 13 November 2015, you are no doubt thankful that you were not in Paris. Paul Stephenson however, was there; in the weeks following he wrote The Days that Followed Paris: 13 November 2015. The formal voice the poet adopts mimics the content of the work which is Read More
A common thread can make a poetry collection form a cohesive whole from the most diverse of parts. When reading Kerrie O’Brien’s first collection Illuminate, it is clear that the connecting thread is the poet herself. She offers the paradox of a youthful maturity. There are wise insights, creating poetry which is both visually and Read More
Against the Light is Stewart Conn’s latest poetry collection. He has won prizes such as Poetry Book Society Choice and SMIT Scottish Poetry Book of the Year Prize among many others. It has three sections, reminding me of a triptych; each of the sections focuses on different themes but together they form a strong collection. Read More
Jimi Hendrix’s melodies merge with the symphonies of George Frideric Handel; an ode to “philosophical couch Platos” resides snugly amongst verse confronting Western imperialism. Unconventional? Indeed – Agard dances between the light and the dark of the human condition throughout Travel Light, Travel Dark, his mischievous ingenuity shining throughout. Split into four sections, this collection Read More
This crashes around the skull. It whispers and it wails. It is the sound we hear when the space around us is silent. Recently shortlisted for the Ted Hughes award, Zoë Skoulding’s The Museum of Disappearing Sounds explores the notion of sound as a codependent relationship between a reader’s external and internal ear. The Museum Read More
Matthew Caley’s fifth collection of poems – Rake – is adventurous, and deliciously eccentric. Having previously been shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection with Thirst, and also having garnered much praise for the bold innovation of his last collection, Apparently, Caley has established himself as a poet who is unafraid to push Read More
Carmen Bugan was born in Romania in 1970 and emigrated to the US in 1989. When still a child, she witnessed first-hand the brutal and repressive regime of Ceausescu, the last Romanian Communist leader. A daughter of a pro-democracy pamphleteer, Bugan grew up fearing news of her father’s death, particularly after his imprisonment. She found Read More
Knowing she would soon be leaving New York, Mary Austin Speaker decided to create a piece of work which would honour the city she had called home for over a decade. The result is her wonderful new book of poetry, The Bridge. One of the reasons that this collection is so compelling is that it Read More