"The river" by Jane Clarke (Bloodaxe, 2015)

Poems from Rialto, North, Acumen, Ambit, Stinging Fly, etc.

The first poem, "Honey", is a disappointing start, and poems like "The Blue Bible" seem slight to me. I like the plot of "The Suitcase" and several other poems. The plot of poems like "Cows at Dugort" doesn't impress though, and it's only the plots that interest me. "River at Dawn" begins with "The Shannon moves through morning mist/ under the arches of Banagher Bridge, steady and slow as a draught horse in harness", which is gentle. Then "A row boat skims the surface with a whisper ... line in, catch, pull back, release". Then a heron rises. I can see how this captures the moment. But the moment's been caught before.

Other reviews

• Tracy Youngblom (To say that Jane Clarke’s debut collection, The River, is accessible is not to criticize it, but to honor it with its due. ... The collection’s narrative moves roughly in chronological order, from poems that describe a childhood spent watching her parents’ farm and care for animals, through the desire for “leaving, making lives / of our own,” to the establishment of an adult life which turns out to be, after all, not so separate from the past.)