Tag Archives: lent

Lent 34: Mrs Noah: Taken After the Flood

I’ve said before that Carol Ann Duffy’s collection The World’s Wife has been a long time favourite. It’s a collection full of the voices of either female versions of known fictional, historical or mythical figures (Queen Kong, Kray Sisters) their … Continue reading

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Lent 33: Dart

Alice Oswald’s second book, Dart, is a 48 page long poem in the voice of the river Dart as it flows from its source to the sea. It’s based on three years of interviews with local inhabitants around the river, … Continue reading

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Lent 32: A Game of Marbles

The 2011 winner of the T S Eliot prize was John Burnside with his twelfth collection, Black Cat Bone. It has some fantastically morbid and twisted poems in. I love this, for example: the girl from the next house but … Continue reading

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Lent 31: Centaur

Today’s poem is from a collection I don’t own, and I’m unlikely to, as it appears to feature pets quite heavily. I am not into pets, not at all. Blame allergies or cat scratches or dog bites or whatever – … Continue reading

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Lent 30: There’s Birds In My Story

Lenontia Flynn’s third collection, Profit and Loss, is in three parts – the first part is based on the idea of rooms or houses holding our histories – specifically family histories, with incredibly personal treatments of her father’s advancing Alzheimers … Continue reading

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Lent 29: Moon Hymn

Inside the jacket of Alice Oswald’s third collection, Woods etc. it says, quite aptly, “Her poems ponder the most elemental of props and portents: water, stone, a wood, the wind, moon, stars, deep space. [Her] theme is nature, but her … Continue reading

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Lent 28: Fathers

I’m sharing another fatherhood poem here, simply because the subject interests me. Not fatherhood itself – the treatment of it in society, culture & the media. Whatever they are. Joanne Limburg’s second collection, Paraphernalia, has many poems on the subject … Continue reading

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Lent 27: Promise

Jackie Kay was inspired to write much of her fourth collection, Life Mask, after having a bronze bust of herself made by Michael Snowden for Edinburgh Park, and meeting her Nigerian birth father for the first time. Her mixed heritage … Continue reading

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Lent 26: Guest post on Frank O’Hara

My lovely friend Vanessa Napolitano has kindly provided this guest post for today! Many of my favourite poets and poems have been recommended my friends, or have been discovered through anthologies or magazines or reading for fun. Frank O’Hara was … Continue reading

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Lent 25: Newly Born Twins

Helen Farish’s first collection is called Intimates, and it is indeed intimate. The poems of love and relationships have recurring feeling of “thank goodness it’s over” (“I’m trying to pinpoint when / the accident of your humanity occurred.” and “Being … Continue reading

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