Single Window (Shortlisted, TS Eliot Prize, 2021)

Single Window is Daniel Sluman’s third collection. In this book-length poem, Sluman meditates on a year of his life (2016-17) when chronic illness confined he and his wife, Emily, to a sofa in their living room. Written in free verse, with powerful use of white space, the words are interlaced with photographs by Emily Brenchi-Sluman. The coupling of word and image in this work not only becomes a documentary but is a powerful nod to the shared nature of their experience.

Remembering Blue

Claire McLaughlin (Survivor’s Press, 2014); pbk, £10 In this her first collection, Claire McLaughlin penetrates the “misty blankness” of vision emerging into the vivid, sensory realm of memory. Blinded by a degenerative retina disease, her poems demonstrate the importance of memory when living without vision. McLaughlin’s account is so intense in its imagery, so arousing Read More