Poetry / poems by individual poets
Andrews McMeel Publishing Self-Love for Small-Town Girls
Book SynopsisSelf-Love for Small Town Girls is an exciting offering from beloved bestselling author Lang Leav. A collection of stunning poetry and prose that seeks to define the loaded question of what it means to be a woman in the modern world.As women, we create lives with our bodies but often do not have autonomy over our own. We create worlds with our words yet struggle to be heard. Collectively, we yearn for the right to be treated with compassion and equity in our public and private spaces. The path to self-love is seldom a smooth one, especially for those who have further to travel. Self-Love for Small Town Girls is a book for anyone seeking the best and brightest version of themselves. Spanning decades of growth through self-analysis and introspection, Self-Love for Small Town Girls is Lang’s most personal and stunning collection to date.
£10.79
Faber & Faber Tales from Ovid Twentyfour Passages from the
Book SynopsisWhen Michael Hofmann and James Lasdun''s ground-breaking anthology After Ovid (also Faber) was published in 1995, Hughes''s three contributions to the collective effort were nominated by most critics as outstanding. He had shown that rare translator''s gift for providing not just an accurate account of the original, but one so thoroughly imbued with his own qualities that it was as if Latin and English poet were somehow the same person. Tales from Ovid, which went on to win the Whitbread Prize for Poetry, continued the project of recreation with 24 passages, including the stories of Phaeton, Actaeon, Echo and Narcissus, Procne, Midas and Pyramus and Thisbe. In them, Hughes''s supreme narrative and poetic skills combine to produce a book that stands, alongside his Crow and Gaudete, as an inspired addition to the myth-making of our time.
£13.49
Enitharmon Press Christmas Poems
Book SynopsisFeatures Christmas poems from a range of years, in a range of styles.Trade Review'U. A. Fanthorpe is a national treasure. A new book from her is always a unique pleasure to be savoured for its truth, disconcerting obliqueness and even more disconcerting directness.' Liz Lochhead, Poetry Book Society Bulletin
£9.49
Flapjack Press Poetic Off Licence
Book SynopsisSince running away from home at the age of 28, award winning writer Hovis Presley (the award wasn't for writing) has found fame as the inventor of the bra-less strap and the individually wrapped baked bean. His interests include postal kerplunk and choosing the 8 sandwiches he'd take to a desert island–currently 7 cheese and an egg mayonnaise.Trade Review“Never stops being funny.” – The Guardian; “Absolutely brilliant.” – Mark Radcliffe; “A slice of Real Loaf.” – John Hegley; “Ooooph!” – John Shuttleworth; “The other day I met Hovis Presley, a fine poet and a true gentleman. So I had a drink with all three of them.” – John Cooper Clarke
£9.50
Dover Publications Inc. Leaves of Grass
Book SynopsisThe most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed. Ralph Waldo Emerson. Inspired by transcendentalism, Whitman''s immortal collection includes some of the greatest poems of modern times, including his masterpiece Song of Myself. Shattering standard conventions of symbolism and allegory, it stands as an unabashed celebration of body and nature.
£5.62
Pan Macmillan The Bees
Book Synopsis‘Swooningly glorious’ The Times‘Indisputably her best volume’ Sunday TimesThe Bees is Carol Ann Duffy’s first collection of poems as Poet Laureate. In it she uses her full poetic range: there are drinking songs, love poems, poems of political anger; there are elegies, too, for beloved friends, and – most movingly – the poet’s own mother. Woven and weaving through the book is its presiding spirit: the bee. Sometimes the bee is Duffy’s subject, sometimes it strays into the poem, or hovers at its edge. In the end, Duffy’s point is clear: the bee symbolizes what we have left of grace in the world, and what is most precious and necessary for us to protect. The Bees, at once intimate and public, is a work of great power from one of our most cherished poets.Trade ReviewBeautiful and moving poetry for the real world -- Jeanette Winterson * Guardian *Wonderful . . . a poet alert to every sound and shape of language * Sunday Telegraph *Duffy is magnificent, grounded, heartfelt, dedicated to the notion that poetry can give us the music of life itself * Scotsman *
£10.44
Central Avenue Publishing Persephone Made Me Do It
Book SynopsisBestselling and Goodreads Choice Award-winning author Trista Mateer returns with another mythical approach to self-care in her newest poetry collection, Persephone Made Me Do It. Following her previous work in this series, Mateer weaves together mythology, tarot, poetry, and conversation to reveal a new side of a very old story. Alternating between the perspectives of poet and goddess, Persephone’s lore is explored, related to modern issues, and ultimately reclaimed.“You want to talk about duality? You want to talk about love? Let us speak instead of chaos.”In this new collection of art and feminist verse from Trista Mateer, Persephone might have flowers in her hair—but she is out for blood.
£11.96
Simon & Schuster Ltd In the Footsteps of Du Fu
Book Synopsis'Superb... Beautifully written and thoroughly researched' - Guardian A beautifully illustrated travelogue, chronicling the life and work of one of the world greatest poets. Du Fu (712-70) is one of China’s greatest poets. His career coincided with periods of famine, war and huge upheaval, yet his secular philosophical vision, combined with his empathy for the common folk of his nation, ensured that he soon became revered. Like Shakespeare or Dante, his poetry resonates in a timeless manner that ensures it is always relevant and offers something new to the modern generation. Now, in this beautifully illustrated book, broadcaster and historian Michael Wood follows in his footsteps to try to understand the places that inspired Du Fu to write some of the most famous and best-loved poetry the world has known. The themes he wrote about – friendship, family, human suffering – are universal and in our troubled times areTrade Review'Superb... Beautifully written and thoroughly researched.' * Guardian *
£14.44
Penguin Books Ltd Layli and Majnun
Book SynopsisTrade Review“A highly engaging tale of impossible love . . . The first verse translation of the 12th-century Persian poet Nezami . . . Davis’s rhythmic translation is full of lush imagery.” ―Publishers Weekly“Nezami . . . paints a visionary world full of erotic tension and trepidation which is both sublimated and enriched with psychological chiaroscuro.” ―Italo Calvino
£12.59
Faber & Faber Selected Poems of Thom Gunn
Book SynopsisA beautifully produced collection of Thom Gunn's classic poetry, illuminated by insightful notes.
£14.24
Penguin Books Ltd Sebald W After Nature
Book SynopsisAfter Nature is the very first literary work by W. G. Sebald, author of Austerlitz''The greatest writer of our time'' Peter CareyAfter Nature by W.G. Sebald, author of Austerlitz, is his first literary work and the start of his highly personal and brilliant writing journey. In this long prose poem, Sebald introduces many of the themes that he explores in his subsequent books. Focusing on the conflict between man and nature, each of the three distinct parts of After Nature give centre stage to a different character from a different century - the last being W.G. Sebald himself.''A deeply intelligent book, but also a marvellously warm, exciting and compassionate one'' Andrew Motion''A début of rare poetic grandeur'' Irish Times''Astonishing writing. A true poet at work'' Evening Standard''Graceful, allusive, serious, but also immensely readable'' Sunday Telegraph''When you read Sebald you are transported to another realm'' Literary ReviewW . G. Sebald was born in Wertach im Allgäu, Germany, in 1944 and died in December 2001. He studied German language and literature in Freiburg, Switzerland and Manchester. In 1996 he took up a position as an assistant lecturer at the University of Manchester and settled permanently in England in 1970. He was Professor of European Literature at the University of East Anglia and is the author of The Emigrants, The Rings of Saturn, Vertigo, Austerlitz, After Nature, On the Natural History of Destruction, Campo Santo, Unrecounted, For Years Now and A Place in the Country. His selected poetry is published in a volume called Across the Land and the Water.Trade Review'A deeply intelligent book, but also a marvellously warm and intelligent one' Andrew Motion
£9.49
HarperCollins Publishers Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Book SynopsisThis elegant deluxe slipcased edition of three medieval English poems, translated by Tolkien for the modern-day reader and containing romance, tragedy, love, sex and honour, features a beautifully decorated text and includes as a bonus the complete text of Tolkien's acclaimed lecture on Sir Gawain.Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Pearl are two poems by an unknown author written in about 1400. Sir Gawain is a romance, a fairy-tale for adults, full of life and colour; but it is also much more than this, being at the same time a powerful moral tale which examines religious and social values.Pearl is apparently an elegy on the death of a child, a poem pervaded with a sense of great personal loss: but, like Gawain it is also a sophisticated and moving debate on much less tangible matters.Sir Orfeo is a slighter romance, belonging to an earlier and different tradition. It was a special favourite of Tolkien's.The three translations represent the complete rhyme and alliterative schemes of tTrade Review‘The introduction to Gawain is a little masterpiece.’Times Higher Educational Supplement ‘This magnificent Arthurian tale of love, sex, honour, social tact, personal integrity and folk-magic is one of the greatest and most approachable narrative poems in the language. Tolkien’s version makes it come triumphantly alive, a moving and consoling elegy.’Birmingham Post
£56.25
Vintage Publishing Song of Myself
Book SynopsisWalt Whitman was born on 31 May 1819 in Long Island, New York. Without much formal education, he began work at an early age as an office boy, printer and school teacher. His first major collection of poetry, Leaves of Grass, was self-published in 1855. During the American Civil War, Whitman volunteered as a nurse at military hospitals in Washington, and his experiences inspired his next collection, Drum-Taps, published in 1865, and Memoranda During the War (1875). Whitman was an ardent Democrat, and wrote several poems to Abraham Lincoln, including O Captain! My Captain'. His poetry was seen by many as immoral, and was the cause of his dismissal from a post as clerk in the Department of the Interior, but he won praise from his contemporaries Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, and his work was enthusiastically received by poetic circles in England. Having survived a paralysing stroke in 1873, Whitman left Washington for Camden, New Jersey, where heTrade ReviewGrand but intimate, earthy but also dreamy * Observer *Whitman had a fluid personality that made him able to ''merge'' invisibly, and with great empathy, with the images of other people and events that lodged in his mind...unprecedented assembling of rhythm, sound, language and images * New York Times *The great unrhymed, long-lined, self-celebratory sensation of the 1850s * Lost Angeles Times *
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd Selected Poems
Book SynopsisRS Thomas was the greatest religious poet writing in English in the 20th century, but the 270 poems he chose for this definitive selection reveal a wide range of themes and concerns. He was a passionate Welsh patriot, but also an outspoken critic of his countrymen. His poems are an expression of his lifelong argument with himself, of his insistent search for God. In them he grapples with ideas of Welshness, with issues of technology, pollution, the decline of culture. He wrote too about love, about landscape, nature and birds. His is an urgent, prophetic and unique voice.
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd Selected Poetry
Book SynopsisLiving in a revolutionary age, Coleridge''s poetry was written in a spirit of moral and emotional inquiry into the absolutes of the human condition. He is best known for his visionary poetry (''Kubla Khan'') and his ballads (''The Rime of the Ancient Mariner''), but he used and transformed a variety of verse forms, from the sonnet to the conversation poem, on subjects as diverse as nature, love, and politics. This selection calls attention to the range of Coleridge''s work, its strong autobiographical content,and its artistic development throughout his career. The old chronological form has been abandoned and the poems are organised according to genre, with each section displaying its own individual development in craft and theme.
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd William Wordsworth Selected Poems
Book SynopsisOne of the major poets of Romanticism, Wordsworth epitomized the spirit of his age with his celebration of the natural world and the spontanous expression of feeling. This volume contains a rich selection from the most creative phase of his life, including extracts from his masterpiece, The Prelude, and the best-loved of his shorter poems such as ''Composed Upon Westminster Bridge'', ''Tintern Abbey'', ''I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud'', ''Lucy Gray'', and ''Michael''. Together these poems demonstrate not only Wordsworth''s astonishing range and power, but the sustained and coherent vision that informed his work.Table of ContentsWilliam Wordsworth: Selected PoemsChronologyIntroductionFurther ReadingA Note on the TextsSelected PoemsOld Man TravellingThe Ruined CottageA Night-PieceThe Old Cumberland BeggarLines Written at a Small Distance from my HouseGoody Blake and Harry GillThe ThornThe Idiot BoyLines Written in Early SpringAnecdote for FathersWe Are SevenExpostulation and ReplyThe Tables TurnedLines Written a Few Miles above Tintern AbbeyThe FountainThe Two April Mornings'A slumber did my spirit seal'Song ('She dwelt among th' untrodden ways')'Strange fits of passion I have known'Lucy GrayNutting'Three years she grew in sun and shower'The BrothersHart-Leap Wellfrom Home at Grasmerefrom Poems on the Naming of Places To Joanna 'A narrow girdle of rough stones and crags'Michael'I travelled among unknown Men'To a Sky-LarkAlice FellBeggarsTo a Butterfly ('Stay near me')To the Cuckoo'My heart leaps up when i behold'To H. C., Six Years Old'Among all lovely things my Love had been'To a Butterfly ('I've watched you')Resolution and Independence'Within our happy Castle there dwelt one''The world is too much with us''With Ships the sea was sprinkled far and nigh''Dear Native Brooks your ways have i pursued''Great Men have been among us''It is not to be thought of that the Flood''When I have borne in memory what has tamed''England! the time is come when thou shouldst wean'Composed by the Seas-Side, near Calais'It is a beauteous Evening, calm and free'To Toussaint L'OuvertureComposed in the Valley, near Dover, on the Day of LandingComposed Upon Westminster BridgeLondon, 1802'Nuns fret not at their Convent's narrow room'Yarrow Unvisited'She was a Phantom of delight'Ode to DutyOde: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood'I wandered lonely as a Cloud'Stepping WestwardThe Solitary ReaperElegiac StanzasA ComplaintGipsiesSt. Paul's'Surprised by joy—impatient asthe Wind'Yew-TreesComposed at Cora LinnYarrow VisitedTo R. B. Haydon, Esq. ('High is our calling, Friend!')Sequel to the Foregoing (Beggars)Ode: Composed upon an Evening of Extraordinary Splendor and BeautyThe River Duddon: Conclusion'The unremitting voice of nightly streams'Airey-Force ValleyExtempore Effusion Upon the Death of James Hogg'Glad sight wherever new with old'At Furness Abbey'I know an aged Man constrained to dwell'from The Prelude Book I Book II Book III Book IV Book V Book VI Book VII Book VIII Book IX Book X Book XI Book XII Book XIIINotesIndex of TitlesIndex of First Lines
£8.99
Penguin Books Ltd The Prelude The Four Texts 1798 1799 1805 1850
Book SynopsisFirst published in July 1850, shortly after Wordsworth''s death, The Prelude was the culmination of over fifty years of creative work. The great Romantic poem of human consciousness, it takes as its theme ''the growth of a poet''s mind'': leading the reader back to Wordsworth''s formative moments of childhood and youth, and detailing his experiences as a radical undergraduate in France at the time of the Revolution. Initially inspired by Coleridge''s exhortation that Wordsworth write a work upon the French Revolution, The Prelude has ultimately become one of the finest examples of poetic autobiography ever written; a fascinating examination of the self that also presents a comprehensive view of the poet''s own creative vision.
£15.29
Penguin Books Ltd The Lais of Marie De France
Book SynopsisMarie de France (fl. late twelfth century) is the earliest known French woman poet and her lais - stories in verse based on Breton tales of chivalry and romance - are among the finest of the genre. Recounting the trials and tribulations of lovers, the lais inhabit a powerfully realized world where very real human protagonists act out their lives against fairy-tale elements of magical beings, potions and beasts. De France takes a subtle and complex view of courtly love, whether telling the story of the knight who betrays his fairy mistress or describing the noblewoman who embroiders her sad tale on the shroud for a nightingale killed by a jealous and suspicious husband.
£999.99
Penguin Books Ltd Jabberwocky and Other Nonsense Collected Poems
Book SynopsisCollects together the range of the author's poetry, including nonsense verse, parodies, burlesques, and more. This title also includes: "The Walrus and the Carpenter", "The Mock Turtle's Song", "Father William" and more.Trade ReviewOpening at random Gillian Beer's new edition of Lewis Carroll's poems, Jabberwocky and Other Nonsense, guarantees a pleasurable experience - not all of it nonsensical -- Michael Caines * Times Literary Supplement *This is an elegant volume, likely to delight enthusiasts, while introducing Lewis Carroll's poetry to a younger readership. The poems are set out chronologically following a generous, thoughtful introduction from the esteemed Cambridge critic Gillian Beer... Beer has done an admirable job, and this edition will appeal to readers of all ages -- Alexandra Lawrie * Times Literary Supplement *
£15.29
Penguin Books Ltd Wade in the Water
Book SynopsisSHORTLISTED FOR THE FORWARD PRIZE FOR BEST COLLECTION 2018A New York Times Notable Book of 2018Even the men in black armor, the onesJangling handcuffs and keys, what elseAre they so buffered against, if not love''s bladeSizing up the heart''s familiar meat?In Wade in the Water, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Tracy K. Smith''s signature voice - inquisitive, lyrical and wry - turns over what it means to be a citizen, a mother and an artist in a culture arbitrated by wealth, men and violence. The various connotations of the title, taken from a spiritual once sung on the Underground Railroad which smuggled slaves to safety in 19th-century America, resurface throughout the book, binding past and present together. Collaged voices and documents recreate both the correspondence between slave owners and the letters sent home by African Americans enlisted in the US Civil War. Survivors'' reports attest to the exTrade ReviewSmith's new book is scorching in both its steady cognizance of America's original racial sins . . . and apprehension about history's direction. . . . These historical poems have a homely, unvarnished sort of grace * The New York Times *The poems in Wade in the Water are full of memorable images nimbly put together by Smith's exquisite sense of timing and her feel for the kind of language appropriate to the poem. * The New York Times Book Review *Smith brings great intelligence and sensitivity to her poems, leading readers deeper into other people's stories and ultimately into their own humanity. * The Washington Post *Smith's poetry is an awakening itself * Vogue *In lines that are as lyrical as they are wise . . . Smith makes connections between the current state of American culture and its history * BuzzFeed *Smith is the country's poetic caretaker, calling both for collective reckoning and collective empathy * The Atlantic *On a craft level, these poems are impeccable. . . . I know brilliance when I read it and this book is brilliant -- Roxane GayFor Smith, poetry is hospitable: accommodating whatever she is moved to write. Her work witnesses, protests and raises its own roof. . . . Smith emerges as a poet in charge of her own creation myth and a recorder of destructive realities * The Observer *Her work witnesses, protests and raises its own roof.... Excellent and bracing -- Kate Kellaway * Observer *Powerful and tender * Elle *Unmissable... a collection of poems exploring what it means to be a woman and a citizen in a culture directed by wealth, men and violence * Stylist *Personal and ambitious * Porter *
£10.44
Oxford University Press The Iliad
Book Synopsis''War, the bringer of tears...''For 2,700 years the Iliad has gripped listeners and readers with the story of Achilles'' anger and Hector''s death. This tragic episode during the siege of Troy, sparked by a quarrel between the leader of the Greek army and its mightiest warrior, Achilles, is played out between mortals and gods, with devastating human consequences. It is a story of many truths, speaking of awesome emotions, the quest for fame and revenge, the plight of women, and the lighthearted laughter of the gods. Above all, it confronts us with war in all its brutality - and with fleeting images of peace, which punctuate the poem as distant memories, startling comparisons, and doomed aspirations. The Iliad''s extraordinary power testifies to the commitment of its many readers, who have turned to it in their own struggles to understand life and death. This elegant and compelling new translation is accompanied by a full introduction and notes that guide the reader in understanding theTrade ReviewHomer's epic [is] unpredictably and achingly beautiful. * Nadia Rogers, Irish Times *
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd Selected Poems
Book Synopsis''Brodsky charged at the world . . . there is no voice, no vision, remotely like it'' The New York Times Book ReviewSelf-educated, intense, impulsive and unmoored, Joseph Brodsky emerged in mid-century Russia as a poetic virtuoso, recognized by such greats as Anna Akhmatova as their worthy heir. He was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972. Together, the poems in this volume unfold the project that, as Brodsky saw it, the condition of exile presented: ''to set the next man - however theoretical he and his needs may be - a bit more free.''This edition includes poems translated by Derek Walcott, Richard Wilbur and Anthony Hecht, and poems written in English or translated by the author himself. It surveys Brodsky''s tumultuous life and illustrious career, and showcases his most notable and poignant work as a poet.Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature Edited and introduced by Ann Kjellberg
£9.49
Dover Publications Inc. Poems of Sappho
Book SynopsisPlato hailed her as the Tenth Muse, and 2,500 years later her voice remains dazzling as well as direct and honest. The lyric poetry of Sappho sings to both sexes of desire, rapture, and sorrow. This concise collection of her surviving works features an Introduction by translator J. M. Edmonds, who supervised the Sappho volume published by Harvard University''s Loeb Classical Library.
£7.14
Faber & Faber Door into the Dark
Book SynopsisWith the sensuousness and physicality of language that would become the hallmark of his early writing, these poems graphically depict the author's rural upbringing, from the local forge to the banks of Lough Neagh, concluding in the preserving waters of the bogland and a look ahead to his next book, Wintering Out (1972).
£11.69
Faber & Faber Sweeney Astray Faber Poetry
Book SynopsisSweeney Astray is Seamus Heaney''s version of the medieval Irish work Buile Suibhne - the first complete translation since 1913. Its hero, Mad Sweeney, undergoes a series of purgatorial adventures after he is cursed by a saint and turned into a bird at the Battle of Moira. The poetry spoken by the mad king, exiled to the trees and the slopes, is among the richest and most immediately appealing in the whole canon of Gaelic literature.Sweeney Astray not only restores to us a work of historical and literary importance but offers the genius of one of our greatest living poets to reinforce its claims on the reader of contemporary literature.
£10.44
Faber & Faber Selected Poems of Lawrence Durrell
Book SynopsisIn this new selection from the poetry of Lawrence Durrell (the first for thirty years), Peter Porter has drawn on the full range of the published work, from A Private Country (1943) to Vega (1973), and has provided a long overdue revaluation of Durrell''s poetic career. In his detailed and generous introduction, Porter makes the case for A Private Country as one of the most accomplished debut collections of the twentieth century, and traces Durrell''s preoccupations and poetic personality within the wider scene. The selection of poems makes its own strong case for the continuing power and originality of this attractive, metropolitan and wholly individual body of work.Trade Review"'As a lyrical poet... he is the equal of Auden.' Gavin Ewart"
£11.69
Faber & Faber Girlhood
Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE DEREK WALCOTT PRIZE FOR POETRYJulia Copus's new collection, Girlhood, is a book of transgressed boundaries and seductive veneers. Restlessly inquisitive, it exposes the shifting power balance between things on the verge of becoming and the forces that threaten to destroy them.Reading these poems, we have the sense of encountering a series of filmic installations arranged by episode in a gallery. Lost, censored or disparaged voices speak out from secluded spaces and moments of hidden history: from within a professor's office and a deserted department store; from kitchens, bedrooms, hallways and upstairs windows; through changing weathers, fidgety shadows and the witching hour.Girlhood concludes with a sequence set in a psychiatric hospital that reimagines Jacques Lacan's treatment of his most famous case study, Marguerite Pantaine. This dramatic meeting of minds has us questioning who is the more delusional doctor or patient: like
£10.44
Faber & Faber Auguries of a Minor God
Book SynopsisSHORTLISTED FOR THE DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE JOHN POLLARD INTERNATIONAL POETRY PRIZEPOETRY BOOK SOCIETY RECOMMENDATIONIn Auguries of a Minor God, her outstanding debut collection, Eipe sings of joys and wounds felt deeply under the skin' David Wheatley, GuardianNidhi Zak/Aria Eipe's spellbinding debut poetry collection explores love and the wounds it makes. Its first half is composed of five sections, corresponding to the five arrows of Kama, the Hindu God of Love, Desire and Memory. From ''stunning'' and ''paralysing'' to ''killing'' and ''destroying'', each arrow has its own effect on some body a very real, contemporary body and its particular journey of love. The second is a long narrative poem, A is for [Arabs]', which follows a different kind of journey: a family of refugees who have fled to the West from conflict in an unspecified Middle Eastern country. With an extraordinary structure, yoking abecedar
£10.44
Faber & Faber Quiet
Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE RATHBONES FOLIO POETRY PRIZEWINNER OF THE JOHN POLLARD INTERNATIONAL POETRY PRIZESHORTLISTED FOR THE T. S. ELIOT PRIZEPOETRY BOOK SOCIETY RECOMMENDATION''In Quiet, Victoria Adukwei Bulley advances a poetics of balance. The poems collected in these pages mix a technically assured, sonically resonant, surface with a profoundly evocative, scrupulously integrated core. This book is a seismic event; its vibrations will be felt for a long time to come.'' Kayo ChingonyiVictoria Adukwei Bulley's debut collection, Quiet, circles around ideas of black interiority, intimacy and selfhood, playing at the the tensions between the impulse to guard one's inner life' and the knowledge that, as Audre Lorde writes, your silence will not protect you'. The poems teem with grace and dignity, are artful in their shapes, sharp in their intelligence, and possessing of a good ear, finely attuned to the sonics that fascinate and motivate the w
£11.69
John Murray Press The Collected Poems of George Mackay Brown
Book SynopsisThe poems of one of Scotland's finest poets collected in a single volume.Trade ReviewExtraordinarily effective * Robert McCrum, The Observer *A brilliant writer * Spectator *George Mackay Brown really does possess the magician's touch * Observer *A dazzling writer * The Guardian *Undoubtedly the most important document of his work to be produced so far. * Shetland Times, Malachy Tallack. *George Mackay Brown has added uniquely and steadfastly to the riches of poetry in English: his sense of the world and his way with words are powerfully at one with each other * Seamus Heaney *The Collected Poems show the range and depth of his work, the beauty of it, "the undersong of terrible holy joy" * Scotsman *The reader embarks on a voyage - which is how Mackay Brown himself saw his work - through the elemental world of his cliff-girt, craggy isles. * The Times, Rachel Campbell-Johnston *Practically every poem has the bite of originality * TLS *'Mackay Brown was a bardic, celebratory poet who swathed all that he wrote about in a kind of caul of sacredness' * Independent, Michael Glover *'A must-have... [Mackay Brown] transforms the mundane with a luminous lyricism' * The Times, Rachel Campbell-Johnston *'The work has both a severe beauty and mischievous wit' * The Sunday Times *
£17.00
Austin Macauley Publishers Where It Had All Escaped Too Soon
Book Synopsis
£10.44
Out-Spoken Press Stay Dead
Book Synopsis
£11.39
Andrews McMeel Publishing Sorry I Haven't Texted You Back
Book SynopsisSorry I haven’t texted you back, (I’ve been so anxious and depressed) I haven’t had time to catch my breath, you know how life gets!Returning to the form of Stuff I’ve Been Feeling Lately, Sorry I Haven’t Texted You Back is a poetic mixtape dedicated to those who struggle or have struggled with their mental health. Divided into two parts, “Side A” holds 92 poems, titled as “tracks,” and “Side B” holds the “remixes,” or blackout-poetry versions, of those 92 poems. The book includes the evergreen themes of love, grief, and hope. Named after Cook’s viral Instagram poem, Sorry I Haven’t Texted You Back lands in the crossroads of self-help and poetry.
£9.49
Pan Macmillan Selected Poems
Book SynopsisA pioneer of the Romantic movement, William Wordsworth wrote about the natural world and human emotion with a clarity of language which revolutionized poetry. Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library; a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket-sized classics with gold foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition has an introduction by Peter Harness.Selected Poems brings together some of Wordsworth’s most acclaimed and influential works, including an extract from his magnus opus, The Prelude, alongside shorter poems such as ‘I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud’, ‘To a Skylark’ and ‘Tintern Abbey’. Wordsworth’s poems, often written at his home in Grasmere in the beautiful English Lake District, are lyrical evocations of nature and of spirituality. They have a force and clarity of language akin to everyday speech which was truly groundbreaking.Trade ReviewWordsworth is a figure of supreme interest -- James Fenton * New York Times *He has done more for the sanity of his generation than any other writer -- Ralph Waldo EmersonWordsworth may be trusted as a guide in everything -- John RuskinThe intrepidity with which Wordsworth explored his own inner life and the generosity with which he shared it remain more than convincing: even now, they continue to define the highest aspirations of modern poetry -- Adam Kirsch * New Yorker *Table of ContentsIntroduction - i: Introduction Section - 1: ‘My Heart Leaps Up When I Behold’ Section - 2: We Are Seven Section - 3: ‘Strange Fits of Passion Have I Known’ Section - 4: ‘She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways’ Section - 5: ‘I Travelled Among Unknown Men’ Section - 6: ‘Yes! Thou Art Fair, Yet Be Not Moved’ Section - 7: Address to My Infant Daughter, Dora Section - 8: Airey- Force Valley Section - 9: Yew- Trees Section - 10: Nutting Section - 11: ‘She Was a Phantom of Delight’ Section - 12: To the Cuckoo Section - 13: ‘A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal’ Section - 14: ‘I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud’ Section - 15: Resolution and Independence Section - 16: The Thorn Section - 17: Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey Section - 18: ‘It Is No Spirit Who From Heaven Hath Flown’ Section - 19: French Revolution Section - 20: To A Skylark Section - 21: To Sleep Section - 22: To Sleep Section - 23: To Sleep Section - 24: The Infant M— M— Section - 25: ‘Surprised by Joy – Impatient as the Wind’ Section - 26: ‘Methought I Saw the Footsteps of a Throne’ Section - 27: ‘It is a Beauteous Evening, Calm and Free’ Section - 28: ‘The World Is Too Much With Us’ Section - 29: Composed Upon Westminster Bridge Section - 30: To—, in Her Seventieth Year Section - 31: The Solitary Reaper Section - 32: At the Grave of Burns Section - 33: Calais Section - 34: To Toussaint L’Ouverture Section - 35: September 1, 1802 Section - 36: Written in London, September, 1802 Section - 37: London, 1802 Section - 38: ODE Section - 39: Incident at Brugès Section - 40: Aix-la-Chapelle Section - 41: Mutability Section - 42: ‘The Sun Has Long Been Set’ Section - 43: Expostulation and Reply Section - 44: The Tables Turned Section - 45: Lines Written in Early Spring Section - 46: To My Sister Section - 47: Simon Lee Section - 48: A Poet’s Epitaph Section - 49: The Two April Mornings Section - 50: The Fountain Section - 51: A Night Thought Section - 52: SONNET Section - 53: To a Child Section - 54: PRELUDE Section - 55: The Two Thieves Section - 56: ‘There Is a Bondage Worse, Far Worse, To Bear’ Section - 57: Elegiac Stanzas Section - 58: Intimations of Immortality Section - 59: The Prelude: Book I Section - 60: The Prelude: Book II Index - ii: Index of First Lines
£10.44
Smokestack Books Mad Parade
Book Synopsis
£7.59
Bloodaxe Books Ltd The Shadow of Words
Book SynopsisAna Blandiana is one of Romania's foremost poets, a leading dissident before the fall of Communism, and now one of her country's strongest candidates for the Nobel Prize. The Shadow of Words covers Blandiana's early collections published from 1964 to 1981, completing Bloodaxe's presentation of her collected poems to date in English translation.
£13.49
Bloodaxe Books Ltd The Wrong Person to Ask
Book SynopsisWinner of the James Berry Poetry Prize. Marjorie Lotfi’s award-winning debut collection is a book of two halves, each a meditation on the idea of home, both the places we start and end up in our lives. Spanning a childhood in Iran dislocated by revolution, through years as a young woman in America, to her current home in Scotland, these poems ask what it means to come from somewhere else, what we carry with us when we leave, and how we land in a new place and finally come to rest. Poetry Book Society Special Commendation.Trade ReviewThe Wrong Person to Ask by Marjorie Lotfi is a wondrous treasure – elegant poems of great tenderness and detail, vivid in heart and imagery, mesmerising in power. Whole worlds and people shimmer alive through scenes and stories of exile, departure, arrival, but most importantly, clear witness and remembrance. A deeply honouring book fully built of love. -- Naomi Shihab NyeIn this unforgettable and assured debut collection, Lotfi explores issues of belonging and identity – firstly the lost world of an Iranian childhood through the eyes of a young refugee and ultimately the found worlds of America and Scotland. She brilliantly illustrates the little tragedies of global politics by focussing on the luminous, ordinary rituals of daily life. These are poems built both to haunt and reaffirm us; poems of the living, breathing world and our overarching right to find a home in it. -- John GlendayTable of ContentsI 13 Refuge 14 On seeing Iran in the news, I want to say 15 The Wrong Person to Ask 16 Two Grandmothers 17 Maman Bozorg 18 The gun in its holster 19 Riding the Line 20 The Game 21 Crossing the street for mother’s cigarettes 22 Shut Out the Noise 23 Packing for America 24 Hope 25 To the Airport 26 Origin 27 The Last Thing 28 Alarm I 29 Alarm II 30 I Picture of Girl and Small Boy (Burij, Gaza, 2014) 31 II Picture of Boy, Looking Away (Gaza, 2015) 32 Gabriella’s Dream 33 What You See in the Dark 34 Wishbone 35 Correction 36 Destruction of the Forty Martyrs Cathedral, Aleppo, Syria 37 Granddaughter, I entered your mother’s house 38 Checkpoint, Matveyev Kurgan 39 Khanoom 40 The End of the Road 40 i [There’s a moment every morning] 41 ii [Each breath in this place] 42 iii [Every blade against the cutting-board] 43 iv [She takes her boys back every summer] 44 v [Even in this lack of light, she sees] 45 vi [The boys carry her good looks] 46 vii [In her eightieth year, she sees her sisters] II 49 Sea Gooseberry (Pleurobrachia) 50 Sunday on the Luing Sound 51 Number 9 Cullipool 52 Sunflower 53 Star of the Sea 54 Williamina Fleming 55 What Work Is 56 Omega Centauri 57 Drift 58 Say It’s Nothing, Say It’s Rust 59 Horizon 60 Out to Sea 61 When They Ask 62 The Trunk 63 After the Match 64 The first thing he doesn’t forget 65 The Unfinished House 66 Storm Light 67 The Last Keeper 68 Citizen 69 Moving 70 And this is how it begins 71 O Love! 72 Edward Thomas on His Last Night with Helen 73 Keep 74 The Hebridean Crab Apple 76 Acknowledgements
£10.44
Poetry Wales Press A Darker Way
Book SynopsisGrahame Davies? s A Darker Way ?is a collection of poems and songs which traces a hard-won but redemptive path between idealism and irony, failure and faith. Including ? Sacred Fire? , set to music for King Charles? coronation, these poems are steeped in curiosity, self-questioning and compassion.
£10.44
Poetry Wales Press Portrait in Mustard
Book Synopsis
£6.00
Vintage Publishing Ash Keys
Book SynopsisMichael Longley (Author) Michael Longley's thirteen collections have received many awards, among them the Whitbread Prize, the T.S. Eliot Prize, the Hawthornden Prize, the Irish Times Poetry Prize and the Griffin International Prize. His Collected Poems was published in 2006, and Sidelines: Selected Prose in 2017. In 2001 he received the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry, and in 2003 the Wilfred Owen Award. He was appointed CBE in 2010, and from 2007 to 2010 was Ireland Professor of Poetry. In 2017 he received the PEN Pinter Prize, and in 2018 the inaugural Yakamochi Medal. In 2015 he was made a Freeman of the City of Belfast, where he and his wife the critic Edna Longley live and work. In 2022 he was awarded the prestigious Feltrinelli International Poetry Prize for a lifetime's achievement.Paul Muldoon (Foreword By) Paul Muldoon is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of fourteen full-length collections of poetry, including Howdie-Skelp.
£11.70
Cinnamon Press Alone with Seoul
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£9.37
Carcanet Press Ltd Passion
Book Synopsis
£11.69
Carcanet Press Ltd A Letter to the Dead
£17.00
Canongate Books Bloodshot Monochrome
Book SynopsisBloodshot Monochrome is a glorious poetic take on all things black, white and read. Reinventing the sonnet, Patience Agbabi shines her euphoric, musical lines on everything from growing up to growing old, from Northern Soul to contract killers, from the retro to the brand new. Whether resurrecting the dead in 'Problem Pages', playing out noir dramas in 'Vicious Circle', or capturing moments of her own life in perfect snapshot, Agbabi's verse is sublimely lyrical and spiked with gleeful humour.Trade ReviewPraise for Transformatrix:A rising star. * * Observer * *Thrilling. Has a multi-dimensional richness. It's a bold, brassy work. * * Independent on Sunday * *Draws on rap, jive and disco rhythms as much as the formal subtleties of free verse. Agbabi is a fine poet, and her linguistic wit carries satirical fire. * * Daily Telegraph * *Combines cutting satire and outright celebration. * * Big Issue * *[Patience Agbabi's] love of the English language, and finding new ways she can subvert it, shines through. Honest, darkly funny and endlessly creative, she takes the sonnet, chats it up, tattoos it, gives it some motherly advice and then sends it away again. -- Claire Sawers * * The List * *Still as hard-hitting on contemporary themes of race, sex and identity as she was when she published her first collection . . . combines the mastery of the tools of her poetic trade with contemporary and very personal themes . . . Her words are crisp, clear and beautiful to read. * * Sunday Business Post * *Agbabi frisks the sonnet in a way it's never been frisked before . . . Thrumming with energy and verve, she brings the stage to the page in her tight rhythms and adherence to rhyme . . . A confident, confluent performance from a master of "lyrical slang". -- Peggy Hughes * * Scotland on Sunday * *Charged with passion, wit and sheer inventiveness. * * New Internationalist * *Moving, in a subtle, understated way; it's characteristic of how Agbabi embeds the profound within the simple . . . These poems - really choppy, rap-inspired prose locked into the 'straitjacket' of the sonnet - showcase Agbabi's considerable wit . . . an adept and engaging take on cultural in-betweenness. * * Poetry London * *
£9.49
Carcanet Press Ltd Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion
Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE 2014 FORWARD PRIZE FOR BEST COLLECTION In this collection, acclaimed Jamaican poet Kei Miller dramatizes what happens when one system of knowledge, one method of understanding place and territory, comes up against another. We watch as the cartographer, used to the scientific methods of assuming control over a place by mapping it, is gradually compelled to recognize--even to envy--a wholly different understanding of place, as he tries to map his way to the rastaman's eternal city of Zion. As the book unfolds the cartographer learns that, on this island of roads that "constrict like throats," every place-name comes freighted with history, and not every place that can be named can be found.Trade Review"Raise high the roofbeams, here comes a strong new presence in poetry... Kei Miller's voice speaks and sings with rare confidence and authority." --Lorna Goodison, Jamaican poet and professor, University of Michigan
£9.95
Bloodaxe Books Ltd Haywire: New & Selected Poems
Book SynopsisLuljeta Lleshanaku belongs to the first "post-totalitarian" generation of Albanian poets. In Haywire she turns to the fallout of her country's past and its relation to herself and her family. Through intense, powerful lyrics, she explores how these histories intertwine and influence her childhood memories and the retelling of her family's stories. Sorrow, death, imprisonment, and desire are some of the themes that echo deeply in Lleshanaku's beautiful poems. Poetry Book Society Recommended Translation.Trade Review'Luljeta Lleshanaku is a pioneer of Albanian poetry. She speaks with a completely original voice, her imagery and language always unexpected and innovative. Her poetry has little connection to poetic styles past or present in America, Europe, or the rest of the world. And, interestingly enough, it is not connected to anything in Albanian poetry either. We have in Lleshanaku a completely original poet' - Peter Constantine. 'Luljeta Lleshanaku's poems take place in a melancholy landscape of mountain villages, chestnut trees, and collapsing futures where spring kills solitude with its solitudeA" and the only emotional expression not considered a sign of weakness is impatience. The place of her poems is like a zero point that can only look out from itself in all directions at once. But the poet looks inward beyond paradox, and, instead of judgment, she finds recognition. In Lleshanaku's work, geography and soul are charted on the same map. The rhythms of her new poems are expertly managed to enact vulnerability and withdrawal. Her lines stretch out and suddenly retract into fragments with the sensitivity of snail horns.' - Forrest Gander, citation for the 2009 International Kristal Vilenica Prize 'These impressive poems carry a poignance much like the first buds of spring, a mark of survival and insistent life. In this bewildering human world such articulate determination proves again our common faith. Luljeta Lleshanaku speaks to us one and all' - Robert Creeley
£9.45
FROM YOU TO ME The Book Of Upside Down Thinking: a magical &
Book SynopsisThe Book Of Upside Down Thinking, by the famed Liverpool poet Brian Patten, is a magical collection of verse written in Morocco and inspired by traditional folk-tales and stories from the Near and Middle East, many dating back as far as the eleventh century. This beautifully designed collection features colourful hand-drawn tile illustrations alongside Brian's original poems, which show the world from a different, and unexpected, perspective. The Book Of Upside Down Thinking is published fifty years after the anniversary of the publication in 1967 of `The Mersey Sound', the ground-breaking poetry collection co-written with fellow-Liverpudlians, Roger McGough and the late Adrian Henri. Witty, contemporary and written in accessible language, the collection transformed the landscape of British poetry. With many award-winning poetry and children's books published since, Brian is set to turn our thinking on its head once more in The Book of Upside Down Thinking.Trade Review'I love the book...these short poems pack a punch...and lure you back for a second look...and a new thought, and a wry smile. 'Bel Mooney; 'A clever, quirky and intriguing squint at human nature' Val Hennessy
£9.49
Two Rivers Press The Weather on the Moon
Book SynopsisTurning Manet on his head, entering the thoughts of a post prandial lion, viewing and buying a ‘snorting’ Hot Rod, imagining life on a modern-day Titanic, wondering what happens to the story after a book is finished or what a sonnet written by a modern day Shakespeare might look like, 'The Weather on the Moon' ranges across art, music, philosophy, literature and poetry, politics, history, science and the natural world to encounter what it’s like to be alive. Bubbling away throughout this intense, sometimes humorous, sometimes quirky, always compassionate poetry is a joy in language, its possibilities, and music. As Graham Hardie writes, his work ‘fuses many elements into one short space: pathos; wit; dexterous use of simile and metaphor; a heightened imagination; an ability to make poetry from the commonplace.’Trade Review‘The humanity of the poems lies in the “momentary turmoil” that for Robin Thomas characterizes life, and which his cast of real and imaginary characters share. History becomes a matter of moments – of awareness, suffering, injustice but also absurdity and beauty’ – Janice Dempsey; ‘The “homely” formal qualities of these well-made poems belie a mystery, a strangeness, a reckoning. The speaker at the end of “Danger Zone” advises us not to spend too long in a place of sanctuary: it’s amongst "the danger and delight of the world you need to be”’ – Julian Stannard;
£8.99
