Poetry Book of the Year

Again, like the ebb and flow of the tide or the fatal fall of the watchmaker's timepiece, Alice Oswald mesmerises me once more with her recently published book of poetry. I am like a rabbit captured in her headlights unable to fully understand the words that cascade and fall off the page and yet remain smitten.  Is it any wonder she is now the Professor of Poetry at Oxford? I don't have the ability or talent to do justice to her most recent collection, "Nobody". All the same, it captivates me, it turns my head and like another Alice, she leads me by the hand down the hole where she reveals to me a world, my world, our world, the world of nature, the natural world and our relationship to it.

Yet another wonderful, wonderful collection of poems. As with Bowie, The Beatles, Captain Beefheart, The Fall and Kate Bush, I so want the magic to continue beyond this moment. But what do I know? I am "Nobody."

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All poems are copyright of the poet. Permission for this poet to post their work here has been granted by blog owner. All rights remain with the individual poet and their respective publisher.

"Falling Awake" by Alice Oswald - Poetry Book of The Year

It was a bit vague, wasn't it? A bit devoid of any real comment? I am of course talking about my blog where I boldly state that Alice Oswald's book, "Falling Awake," was "Something For The Weekend, Sir's?" poetry book of the year. It had no substance to it, no opinion, no constructive, positive statement telling why I thought it was such a good book. 

Funny thing is that I have never posted year after year a 'Poetry Book of The Year' here or anywhere else. Not just because it all seems a bit pretentious of me, hardly an expert on poetry, daring not only to voice an opinion of said subject but then having the sheer audacity to select a years best. I did one in 2012 with Barry Hill followed two years later with Janet Sutherland. So in many respects, this is the follow on to the "Bone Monkey."  And what a follow on.

Still, my previous post remains bereft of a why and a therefore as to my selection so, let's put matters right, let me tell you, belatedly, why I enjoyed it so.

Truth to tell I have only two of Alice Oswald's books. The first being the award-winning "Dart," and of course "Falling Awake." 

With "Dart" I felt the whole poem rolled and thundered, splashed and foamed, with the voice of the river itself. Even the little asides, those brief annotations that slip into the verse like herring gulls on a weed covered timber pole screeching their Keow ha-ha-ha-ha, which added colour and texture to the rise and rhythm of the words as they flowed, with liquid ease, through the forty-eight-page poem. Like a gospel choir in response to a lyric sung.

The whole poem had/has a natural feel to it almost as though Oswald had transmogrified herself into on of those screaming gulls and through their eyes, through their very connectivity to nature itself, transcribed their feelings as they scooped and dived over the Dart as it ran its course.

Feral? No, I don't think feral is correct. It was, it still is, something other than that. For me now, the man searching to redefine spirituality without either bowing to magic or mysticism, "Dart" is sort of Tao.  Of course, it needn't be a gull. It could just as easily be a swallow or a dragonfly or a crow. Well, maybe not a crow, as that would be too close to Ted Hughes for comfort but you know what I mean - a bird's eye view of the River Dart as witnessed by one of mother nature's denizens.

It seemed as if Alice had her finger's and her toes deep rooted in the riverbank the better to enable her to allow the truth of what she saw to transfer its earthy, damp, wet, silt-sodden story to be written.

Of course, Alice didn't write her poem in the manner I received it. She wrote it as an old man walking, observing, crossing the land, following the line of the river. An old man with tired legs, tried and tested footfalls, a man as common with the common land as the lines on his hands and face. She wrote it as a bailiff, a man with letters after his name,  An exchange in far off places. She captures, heart, body and soul the river but not just the water flowing, the very life of the Dart with all that goes in it, on it, about it and around it. She gives us, does Alice the daily life of the river Dart in all its glory. 

But that was "Dart" and "Dart" has had many an accolade, many an award, all deserved for Alice Oswald is profoundly talented but this should be about "Falling Awake" rather than me falling into the dream of Alice's making, the reality that flit's in my mind like a dream as it re-runs its images over and over and over again. Now, I'm "Falling Awake."

So then, here we have it, the follow-up to the highly acclaimed "Memorial." Having never read that collection I cannot comment. I don't whether there are similarities between that and this or if "Memorial" stands alone in the Oswald cannon. I suspect not. It is certainly different to "Dart" as that was one long, continuous poem whereas with "Falling Awake" we have a collection of poems. That said, the two books do share the same focus, that of nature.

Alice Oswald may very well be our finest poet, there is strong evidence to support that claim and none more so than here. With her ability to create a free-flowing rhythm, her talent with words, her forensic attention to take the detail of those things she has observed and write them down so that the images she has witnessed come alive with an electricity that is quite incredible. And she does it all with such nimble agility, such poise.

Her thread is those things about her. Possibly the Devon she calls home yet this apparent love of the region she lives in has a universal appeal so that literally anyone, anywhere in the world cab appreciate the poems.

My personal favourite is "Swan" but there are many others that could occupy that space for this is a luscious, rich assembly of poems. This really is a remarkable book in every sense, a book you will return to time and again.

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All poems are copyright of the poet. Permission for this poet to post his/her work here has been granted by blog owner. All rights remain with the individual poet and their respective publisher.

Poetry Book of the Year

When I last wrote here it was to say that this site was closing for business in the light of what appeared apathetic disinterest. Perhaps that was disingenuous of me. I'd like to think I got it wrong and that there are poets out there who believe in reading their work aloud. I hope so. I sincerely would like to see this site brought alive again with an influx of spoken word poetry.

When I last wrote here it was December 2015. I apologised that I had not written or rather posted, as I had in previous years, 'Something For The Weekend, Sir's' Poetry Book of the Year. Well, this year I have.

"Falling Awake" by Alice Oswald 

. . All poems are copyright of the poet. Permission for this poet to post his/her work here has been granted by blog owner. All rights remain with the individual poet and their respective publisher.

Poetry Book of the Year

This time last year, filled with passion and hope following the wonderful slew of spoken word poetry that appeared here On Something For The Weekend, Sir? I had the audacity to write the following piece....

http://fishyfarts.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/poetry-book-of-year-2014-bone-monkey-by.html

Sadly this year, due to three different sets of circumstances the enthusiasm I had at that point has not so much gone as been pushed aside for awhile.

1.The incredible poets who recorded their work have not been followed by others.
2. My intention to keep this site alive by recording my own feeble efforts was thwarted when my PC was hacked preventing me from filming myself.
3. I am currently recovering from another minor stroke and find it hard to type when seeing double ('Tis a bugger and no mistake)

Hopefully, all will be back soon and firing on all cylinders.

If any of the poets who have posted here would like to recommend a book of poetry as this years favoured one, please go ahead and do so!

Poetry Book of the Year - 2014 - 'Bone Monkey' by Janet Sutherland

 

 

The first mistake I made with this highly creative book was to assume, upon seeing the title, that the subject matter had a Pagan slant. Nothing wrong if that were the case. It isn't though. It is far more than that and although the central character is a Loki like, Puckish deity, one who flits in and out of mortal life, the poems featured here have more to do with humankinds spectrum of frailties. From murder to sex, from death and rejuvenation to caring for a dementia sufferer.

Like any book of poetry, unlike a novel, reading it from cover to cover, poem by poem, is never near enough to grasp all of what's been said. I read this through in just over one day. I then returned to it again for the next few weeks. Re-reading and fully digesting each jewel like word.

 

With my woefully inadequate education, one that saw me being expelled following some riotous behaviour, I wouldn't know a sonnet from a punnet. Okay, one has rich delicious fruit in it and is eaten by attendees of Wimbledon. The other is something poets do and that Will Shakespeare was famous for. In this book we find those sonnets nuzzling up against free form poetry. The range is expansive, the emotions found - expressive.

 

 Janet's spritely dance leads us down paths dark, dim yet often exhilarating. Her poetry is sure footed and nimble, weaving as it touches upon a series of linked ambitions, threaded conceits, one central theme  revealing what we already know - mankind is an odd lot.

There are several poems that really thrilled me - 'Red Hibiscus' with its twisted psyche. Bone Monkey being as devious and deviant as a Bone Monkey can be. 'His Exposition on the art of memory,' which carries a distinct melancholic feel to it and finally 'Fire Fleet and Candle Light' an ode to death, dying and the ultimate end of life.

It is the delight in the words that both mesmerise and impress. The sheer exuberant zest for the poetry's spectrum as the colours cast engage the reader, tugging you close, inviting you to feel those rhythm's, urging you to uncover meaning but most important of all to enjoy what in reality is some fine poetry. 

 

Janet Sutherland was born in Salisbury and grew up on a small dairy farm. She studied English at University College, Cardiff, before moving on to gain an MA in American Poetry at University of Essex.  Since 2001, she’s lived in Lewes, East Sussex and as well as pursuing her writing, Janet works part time for Relate in Brighton.

Poetry Book of the Year 2012 - 'Naked Clay' by Barry Hill

From concept to delivery this book of poems really excels. The idea of tackling a painter’s work and transposing those images as words may not be new but the honest, sometimes brutal, way that Barry Hill sets about portraying Lucian Freud’s work is nothing short of masterful. My relatively new introduction to poetry, Dylan Thomas and Basho to one side, has been further excited by this incredible body of work.

Unlike a novel which has a narrative that propels you along urging you to follow its course until you reach that final page, poetry, or so it strikes me, is far more contemplative. As I read one poem I found myself dwelling on it, ruminating over its marvellous rhythms, its meaning and the way the words cascaded.  This book has left me breathless. I return to it again and again.

Barry Hill not so much praises the art of Lucian Freud, although in circumspect fashion he does, as examines it. His take on the famed artists work, his portraits, is as honest an appraisal as it often is blunt and questioning. He really does ask of the art and the artist why? Did Freud ever consider the implications of painting his daughter naked whilst menstruating? It is the 'edgy' approach that elevates this set of poems above all else I have read this year.

Barry Hill is an Australian historian, poet, journalist and academic. He was born in Melbourne, Australia and studied at the University of Melbourne where he gained his Bachelor of Arts (BA), Bachelor of Education (B Ed) and a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) and from there went to London where he gained his Master of Arts (MA) degree from the  University of London.

Hill has worked in both Melbourne and London. In London he worked for the Times Literary Supplement. Since 1975 Hill has been a full-time writer and is currently Poetry Editor of  The Australian newspaper.