"Iona" by Kenneth C Steven (Saint Andrew Press, 2000)

Poems from Edinburgh Review, Other Poetry, Poetry Wales, South, Weyfarers, etc.

On https://kennethsteven.co.uk/iona/ it says that over 5,000 copies have been sold! And Ted Hughes commented “Enjoying Kenneth Steven’s work intensely — style and subject."

There were quite a few poems I didn't like on a first reading - pages 3, 24, 25, 26 (oh dear), 30, 39, 41, 43 - too much unanalysed nostalgia for the good old days of poverty; too easy use of key words to make a piece sound profound. There's quite a lot of imagery, though there's a limit to how many new nature-based comparisons one can make if one excludes new things to compare it with -

• The ones ... Who translated the wind ... are replaced by foreign bodies/ With Range Rovers and mobile phones (p.3) - no. Too simplistic a contrast.
• I found a lamb/ Tugged by the guyropes of the wind ... A voice made of crying, like a child's (p.17) - I mostly like this
• I am not sure ... whether the light is stronger / Or just easier to see (p.18) - I like this
• A landscape battered flat by the wind/ Thistles wave their swords like Viking warriors (p.29) - the first has been done. Do warriors really wave swords like that?
• This land is cut to the bone/ Ashamed of a sin it has not committed,/ Lost in its own history (p.31) - ok
• The threads that wove the fabric of her mind/ Fray one by one and will not end (p.32) - already done
• The moon is a boy's balloon/ Stuck up in the branches (p.44) - it's been done
• Two nuns exchange welcomes;/Their soft words like the water/ That flows through the cress at a well's mouth (p.47) - I like this