It is once again time for Mab Jones to close out the month with a trolley dash through the aisles of fine independent poetry, with titles by Kim Moore and Luke Samuel Yates among others.
Are You Judging Me Yet? Poetry And Everyday Sexism, Kim Moore (Seren, price: £9.99)
Are You Judging Me Yet? is a book of essays and poems that intermingle, thoughtfully and eloquently, to examine / explore the subject of sexism. Although Kim Moore admits this concept is “slippery”, she gets a good handle on the topic, coming at it from angles that are personal and philosophical, cultural and creative. Sexism might be ‘benevolent’ or it might be violent; it might nestle within the conversation of a group of friends (good guys, fathers) or prowl out via a single-word heckle from an elderly woman. However, it appears, where it is spotted (and it’s not always easy to spot), “it’s routinely dismissed or minimalised”. The aim of this book, therefore, is to bring it to light and, further, to “create a discourse that crosses boundaries,” which Moore achieves, admirably.
What I found particularly cool is that you can enter the book at different points, and follow through to chapters depending on where you’d like to go, a bit like a Choose Your Own Adventure story. This adds to the sense of the book being cross-boundary but also reflects the ‘bricolage methodology’ (collage-style approach) that Moore used for her PhD. For the reader, it adds another layer of interest, subverting the ‘hero’s journey’ linear narrative, perhaps, and working in a rounder, richer way. I also found it more considerate of the reader, really, as it presumes that we are all different. This makes the approach incredibly fresh and adds to the book’s all-round excellence. A fascinating read.
Chasing Clouds… Adventures In A Poetry Balloon, Jonathan Humble [ed.] (The Dirigible Balloon, price: £9.95)
It was through the poet Lesley James that I first heard of The Dirigible Balloon, run by writer and all-round good egg Jonathan Humble. Another Humble, Em, is credited with the illustrations in this fun, verse-filled anthology Chasing Clouds, but there is no biographical note to confirm who she is, neither is there one about Jonathan, the editor.
Humble by name and nature, the focus is rather on the community of writers who flock to the Dirigible Balloon website, and the poems themselves. This absence of ego places everyone here at the same level, which is of course refreshing for a reader, even though an introductory note admits that some poets may be more established than others – but it’s not about that here, it’s about offering up the very “best work” for children, which the anthology, of course, succeeds in.
Some poems are serious, some are silly; some poems are thoughtful, and others aim to make us laugh. There’s wordplay and playfulness, rhyme alongside free verse, couplets and plenty of capers. Poems may take the ordinary or the extraordinary as their topic but, either way, they remain of a high standard, showcasing some of the best contemporary poetry for children, and adult and young’uns of all ages will find it all extremely enjoyable.
Incubation: A Space For Monsters, Bhanu Kapil (Prototype, price: £12)
The blurb on the back of Incubation: A Space For Monsters is heart-rending. Taken from one of the prose-poem / poetic prose pieces within, it consists of descriptive sentences which aim to encapsulate Incubation: “This book is for anyone who did not discover, until it was almost too late, that they were beautiful in the eyes of strangers”; “for anyone who, in the middle of their childhood, had the sudden thought: ‘I’m no longer a child’”. Inside are 100+ pages of notes, ideas, experiences and explorations, that affect as they dissect, essentially. Again, this is not a work for the faint of heart, as the I of the book (the author, we assume) immerses into experiences that are, in many cases, unasked for; speculates and surmises on difficult topics; asks questions:
I said: ‘What is a monster?’ You said: ‘Anybody different.’
On the first page, writing of herself and others as ‘monsters’ and ‘cyborgs’ (images that repeat throughout the book), Kapil confesses: “I was born and brought up in a disturbed way by parents whose hearts had broken in another civilisation”. And so, Hindu gods and angels also collide on this first page, too, with the book standing testimony to the inter-cultural clash that takes place when people are transposed from one place to another. Along the way, there’s eloquence and intelligence, but also experimentation and much that might unsettle or disturb. “This book is for all the monsters” – whether you consider yourself such or not, this one is really recommended.
We Saw It All Happen, Julian Bishop (Fly On The Wall, price: £9.99)
I love We Saw It All Happen. Here’s a poet who’s not afraid to use humour as a tool and, wielding it with skill amidst a host of other well-honed instruments, it adds a keener edge to many of these poems, as well as a general liveliness. I am hugely in favour of humour – of all the many sorts – in poems, which often can end up somewhat po-faced in those cases where poets self-censor and do their best to weed it out. Humour is human, and this ecopoetry collection possesses a greater depth, breadth, and height as a result of its inclusion.
However, this is just one silvery strand in a book that is made up of many elements, and which takes us to many places. Although some poems may proffer topics we’d naturally expect in a book of ecopoems, with titles such as Global Warming; Snow Leopard; Green Wash; The Last Days of the Giraffe, others are more unusual, and even in those poems with more expected subjects there’s always the unexpected, as Bishop possess an exuberant, intelligent mind, capable of going – and taking us – anywhere.
The poems are accessible, approachable, and memorable as a result, which for me is the perfect mix. Part of me wondered, actually, why this book wasn’t published by a bigger press (as brilliant as Fly On The Wall are), one with a larger natural distribution, perhaps, but I guess the answer lies in poetry’s entrenched hierarchies, hashtags, fads, and politics. As someone who works in marketing, I often find poetry horribly similar, all about what’s hot and what’s not, what’s cool and who’s cool, really. It makes me hate ‘poetry world’, too often. Here’s a book that’s the opposite of all that: heartfelt, yet hearty, too. Should we stand back and watch it all happen? No, of course not. So, let’s do something about it, and begin by reading this fantastic book.
Dynamo, Luke Samuel Yates (The Poetry Business, price: £10.99)
Speaking of humour, the wit in this next collection, Dynamo, is dry, so dry that it edges towards the surreal, transmuting everyday people, things, and situations into something both less and more; something recognisable, mundane, even, but yet hyperreal at the same time. Buildings rise, pigeons peck at “something… imagined”, a pool sits at the top of a hotel, a bee ‘peruses’ a yard. There’s a laidback, laconic style to the writing, a little like Billy Collins, and just as clever, with a similar edge of irony or the sardonic:
The pineapple plant displays its pineapple
like a trophy it has won
for having grown a pineapple.
The poems overall are very engaging, very interesting, however. The wit is not overbearing, although it is a major feature, here, with the poet working up the ordinary into the extraordinary in many pieces. What I really like is how Yates can spin any seemingly ‘dull’ topic – a flight; writing down a time wrong; popping candy – into a meditation on the strangeness of life. Pace and structure are key in these pieces, too, which are finely tuned, possessing a beautiful and exact sense of what to put and where – the right words in the right order, as they say – translating into a very pleasing reading experience. As you turn the pages, you can’t really guess where the poet is going to take you, something I prize highly.
This book has been praised by far more famous poets than myself, but I will add my own praise here, for what it’s worth. To summarise: this is an excellent, inspiring, sparkling delight of a collection. Please get yourself a copy, and enjoy!
If you would like to submit some new, published poetry for potential review in this column, contact Mab via her website (you can find social media links there) or get in touch via Buzz.
words MAB JONES
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