Good poetry, as Robert Crawford said about John Ashbery’s word craft, “levitates language” from the page. As I read and re-read Miriam Nash’s first book-length collection of poetry, All the Prayers in the House, I am struck with a similar leavening in the composition of the poems as prayers and reading them aloud as “PRAY-ers”. Read More
Ten minutes ago, I wrote these words. Ten minutes; now I think I think them. They knew me first, I fear, another me went first and thought them. Roddy Lumsden’s tenth collection, So Glad I’m Me, has a misleading title; in fact, one of the major themes of the collection questions the very nature of Read More
Already from the south I heard them weeks ago creaking above me through the air at dusk – and then the cold. Eighteen below, each pond a cataract of ice. Where did they go? Read More
They say if you don’t like the Scottish weather just wait a bit and it will change. Arguably, the same might be said of Bear. This collection is so varied that if the style of one poem is not to the reader’s taste, moving on is hardly problematic and very shortly a more agreeable offering Read More
Roy Fisher’s latest collection, Slakki: New & Neglected Poems, epitomizes the poet’s struggle to stabilize his “everyday self — a quite presentable, penurious, and apparently unambitious young man” in his poetry. The process of putting together the collection addresses the creation of a poetic identity, the representation of Fisher the writer. Fisher’s collection is a Read More
What strikes you immediately with Greetings from Grandpa is Jack Mapanje’s voice. The poems have a directness, as if the poet is speaking straight to the reader, plainly and conversationally. Poet and reader in the same room. Mapanje is a Malawian poet, linguist and human rights activist who was imprisoned from 1987 to 1991 by Read More
Women like me do not know how to speak. A word remains in their throats like a thorn they choose to swallow. Choose to swallow. In this first translation of her work into English, Syrian-born poet Maram Al-Massri confesses her secrets to us. Al-Massri is a woman stuck. Stuck between Arab tradition and modern femininity. Read More
The three collections encapsulated in Love is a place – It wasn’t far away or difficult (2010), The signal is fading (2012) and From where to begin to love again (2014) have been translated from Catalan to English by Anna Crowe, a skilled veteran of poetry in translation. Joan Margarit is an award-winning poet who 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
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