Be Feared, Jane Burn, Nine Arches Press, 2021, ISBN: 978-1-913437-27-5, £9.99

The Pleasures of Peace, Paul Rossiter, Isobar Press, 2021, ISBN 978-4-907359-34-8, £14.61

Infinite Cilia, David Greenslade and John Welson, 2020, ISBN13 9798669045395, NP

Ubiquitext, David Greenslade, Stephen the Great University Editions, Romania, April 2021, NP

City of Opal Altars, David Greenslade, Muşatinii Press (also Romania), 2021

The poems in Jane Burn’s Be Feared are typically richly textured bundles of language, somewhat reminiscent of Dylan Thomas, and serving to enact a kind of sensory overload, the taking in of more reality than the brain can easily contain:

See how this bird knocks her cheek against a cupboard door

and bat, bat, bat! comes a sound of wood bumping against flesh.

The smell of varnish, bitter. The nurture of wood, divine.

Elbow-flicker, elbow-flack, great misguided flight. The air

is a flabbergast of space, a fatigue…

This Overflowing Light: Selected Poems, Rin Ishigaki (edited and introduced by Janine Beichman), Isobar Press, 2022, ISBN 978-4-907359-41-6, £15.04

With the publication of Rin Ishigaki’s selected poems, Isobar Press continue my education in 20^th century Japanese poetry. Ishigaki’s story is a peculiarly Japanese one, it seems to me. Born in 1920, she seems to have had a conventional enough Shinto upbringing with one exception; from an early age she wrote and published her writings in magazines aimed specifically at young female writers. As she did not collect any of these early poems, they do not feature here.

As was the case for so many of her compatriots, defeat in 1945 changed everything as she discovered that all she had been brought up to believe about her country was built on lies.

She had, by then, been working in a bank for a number of years, and under…

This one was inspired by all the photos you can see on Paul Brookes’ blog here.

Circular economy

Nothing is ever wasted,
every mark and sign recycled.

Trees brush away the shreds of cloud,
bustling scudding flocks of dogs and sheep
fill both sky and deep water,

soaking up the last of the light,
and looking down fondly
on the sleeping shadow-sea,

where the long bones of sky dragons
lie, lapping cold water
where polished glass gems gleam,

dreaming of the high, crisp air,
and sunfire blazing in the west.

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Victoria Twomey is an award-winning poet and artist. Her poems have been published in several anthologies, in newspapers and online, including BigCityLit, The Long Island Quarterly, The Tipton Poetry Journal, Verse-Virtual, The Agape Review, The Trouvaille Review and The RavensPerch. Her poem ‘Pieta’ was nominated for a Pushcart Prize, while ‘Paradise’ was a finalist in the 2022 Rash Award in Poetry Contest from Broad River Review, and ‘White Dress on a Clothesline’ was awarded the 95th Moon Prize from Writing In A Woman’s Voice. Her forthcoming book of poetry, Glimpse, will be published by Kelsay Books in 2023.

*****

Victoria writes about her work

‘Can You Hear It?’ began with the question, ‘What is the sound of the creator, of creation, of existence?’ This persisted in my mind for weeks. I view nature and death as beings with something profound to tell me, if I will…

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The Poets 

Mike Barlow • Terese Coe • Ralph Culver • Greg Freeman • Katherine Gallagher • Ann GibsonJenny Hockey • Mark Holihan • Martha Landeman • Sarah Lawson • Gil Learner • Maggie Mackay • Kathy Miles • Michael Penny • Karen Petersen • Estill Pollock • Patrick Davidson Roberts •  Mark Roper • Bob Saxton • Penny Sharman • Myra Schneider • Finola Scott • John Short • Patrick Slevin • Sam Smith • Paul Stephenson • Anne Symons • Victoria Twomey • Susan Utting • Robin Lindsay Wilson •  Rodney Wood • Martin Zarrop

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Previous Poetry

THW27: September 5, 2022 • THW26: June 6, 2022  • THW25: March 6, 2022 • THW24: December 3, 2021 • THW23: • THW22: June 6, 2021  •  THW21: March 8, 2021 • THW20: December 4, 2020 •THW19: September 5, 2020 • THW18: May 4, 2020 …