Four sections whose subject matter contrasts more than their styles. The first section's stronger on nostalgia than poetry, the language metaphoric in the way that some journalism is.
The butcher in "Butcher's Ghazal" is similar to the one in Sally Goldsmith's book that I've been reading. I liked "Under Thomas Hardy's Skin", with its rhyming. I liked "Between villages".
Sometimes there are too many words - e.g. "Your tentative boot rests on a glistening rail" (p.38). The sonnet "Disarmed" ends with "Now she's gone we're all somehow/ more exposed: our horizon's undermined/ and shadows are less sharply defined". "Two Months Apart" spins out one idea over 26 lines.
No comments:
Post a Comment